The child's conception of the world

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International Library of Psychology
Philosophy and Scientific Method

The Child s Conception
of the World

The Child's Conception
of the World

Br
JEAN PIAGET

Doctor of Science, Director of -the Institut Rousseau, Professor
at the University of Geneva, Author of "Language and Thought
of the Child," and" Judgment and Reasoning in the Child"

LONDON

ROUTLEDGE & KEGAN PAUL LTD

BROADWAY HOUSE: 68-74 CARTER LANE EC4V 5EL

First Published in England \Q2g.
Reprinted 1931, ig6o, 1964, ig6y and igyi

Printed in Great Britain by
Redwood Press Limited, Trowbridge & London

ISBN o 7100 3068 I

Translated by
JOAN AND ANDREW TOMLINSON

Students and former Students of the J. J. Rousseau
Institute who collaborated in this work

Mile A. Bodourian (Chap, ii, ix and x)

Mile G. GuEX (Chap, i, iii, vii, viii and x)

Mile R. Hebner (Chap, viii)

Mile H. Krafft (Chap, i, iii, v, vii and ix)

Mile E. Margairaz (Chap, ix and x)

Mile S. Perret (Chap, i, iii, v and viii)

Mme V. J. PiAGET (Chap, i, iii, vii and ix)

Mile M. Rodrigo (Chap, iii and ix)

Mile M. Rond (Chap, ix)

Mile N. SwETLOVA (Chap, ii, ix and x)

M. le Dr Versteeg (Chap, iii)

1 "n^il^

CONTENTS

PAGE

Introduction. — Problems and Methods . . i

§ I. Method of tests, pure observation and the clinical
method, p. 2. — § 2. The five types of reaction revealed
by clinical examination, p. 10.— § 3. Rules and criteria
for the diagnosis of the preceding types of reaction,
p. 18. — § 4. Rules for the interpretation of the results,
P- 23.

PART I.— REALISM 33

Chapter I. — The Notion of Thought . . 37

§ I. The first stage : thinking is with the mouth, p. 39.
— § 2. Looking and seeing, p. 47. — § 3. The second and
third stages : thinking is with the head, p. 49. — § 4.
Words and things, p. 55.

Chapter II. — Nominal Realism ... 61

§ I. The origin of names, p. 63. — § 2. The place of
names, p. 71. — § 3. The intrinsic value of names, p. 80.
— § 4. Conclusions, p. 85.

Chapter III. — Dreams 88

§ I . The first stage : the dream comes from outside and
remains external, p. 91. — § 2. The second stage : the
dream arises in us ourselves, but is external to us,
p. 106. — § 3. The third stage : the dream is internal
and of internal origin, p. 117. — § 4. Conclusions, p. 119.

Chapter IV. — Realism and the Origin of the

Idea of Participation .... 123

§ I. Realism and the consciousness of self, p. 124. —
§ 2. Participation and magical practices, p. 131. —
§ 3. The origins of participation and magic as mani-
fested in the child, p. 150. — § 4. Corroborative proof :
spontaneous magical ideas in the adult, p. 162. — § 5.
Conclusion : logical and ontological egocentricity,
p. 166.

vii

viii CONTENTS

PART II.— ANIMISM 169

171

Chapter V. — Consciousness attributed to
Things

§ I. The first stage : all things are conscious, p. 174.
— § 2. The second stage : things that can move are
conscious, p. 179. — § 3. The third stage : things that
can move of their own accord are conscious, p. 182. —
§ 4. The fourth stage : consciousness is restricted to
animals, p. 185. — § 5. Conclusions, p. 187.

Chapter VI, — The Concept of " Life " . . 194

§ I. The first stage : life is assimilated to activity in
general, p. 196. — § 2. The second stage : life is assimi-
lated to movement, p. 199. — § 3. The third and fourth
stages : Ufe is assimilated to spontaneous movement,
then later is restricted to animals and plants, p. 201.
— § 4. Conclusion : the notion of " life," p. 204.

Chapter VII. — The Origins of Child Animism,

Moral Necessity and Physical Determinism 207

§ I. The child's spontaneous animism, p. 207. — § 2.
The sun and moon follow us, p. 213. — § 3. Physical
determinism and moral necessity, p. 222. — § 4. Con-
clusions. The significance of the questions on child
animism, and the nature of " diffuse animism," p. 228.
— § 5. Conclusions (continued) : the origins of child
animism, p. 234.

PART III.— ARTIFICIALISM . . . .253

Chapter VIII. — The Origin of the Sun and

Moon 256

§ I. A primitive example of the first stage, p. 258. —
§ 2. The first stage : the sun and moon are made
artificially, p. 263. — § 3. The second and the third
stages : the origin of the sun and moon is first partly,
then completely, natural, p. 272. — § 4. The quarters
of the moon, p. 280.

CONTENTS ix

Index of Names

PACE

Chapter IX. — Meteorology and the Origin of
Water 285

§ I. The sky, p. 287. — § 2. The cause and the nature
of night, p. 291. — § 3. The origin of the clouds, p. 298. —
§ 4. Thunder and lightning, p. 307. — § 5. The forma-
tion of rain, p. 311. — § 6. The explanations of snow,
ice and cold, p. 320. — § 7. Rivers, lakes and sea, the
primitive origin of water, p. 326.

Chapter X. — The Origin of Trees, Mountains

AND OF the Earth 333

§ I. The origin of wood and of plants, p. 334. — § 2. The
origin of iron, glass, cloth, and of paper, p. 337. — § 3.
The origin of stones and of earth, p. 339. — § 4. Origin
of the mountains, p. 347.

Chapter XI. — ^The Meaning and Origins of
Child Artificialism 350

§ I. The meaning of child artihciahsm, p. 350. — § 2.
The relations of artificialism with the problem of the
birth of babies, p. 360. — § 3. The stages of spontaneous
artificiaUsm and lieir relation with the development
of animism, p. 369. — § 4. The origins of artificialism,
P- 376. — § 5. The origins of identification and the
causes of the decUne of artificialism and animism,
p. 384.

Appendix. — Note on the Relations between
BELIEF IN Efficacy and Magic, in connection
with §§ 2 AND 3 OF Chapter IV . . . 389

395

General Index 396

INTRODUCTION
PROBLEMS AND METHODS

The subject of this investigation — one of the most
important but also one of the most difficult in child
psychology — is as follows : What conceptions of the world
does the child naturally form at the different stages of its
development ? There are two essential standpoints from
which the problem must be studied. Firstly, what is the
modahty of child thought : in other words, what is the
scheme of reahty which prompts this thought ? Does
the child, in fact, believe, as we do, in a real world and
does he distinguish the behef from the various fictions of
play and of imagination ? To what extent does he dis-
tinguish the external world from an internal or subjective
world and what limits does he draw between his self and
objective reality ? These are the questions which make up
the first problem, the child's notion of reality.

A second fundamental problem is bound up with that
just stated ; namely the significance of explanations put
forward by the child. What use does he make of the
notions of cause and of law ? What is the nature of the
causahty he accepts ? Explanation as exercised by
savages or in the sciences has been studied, as also the
various forms of philosophical explanation. Is the form
of explanation presented by the child of a new type ?
These and like questions form the second problem, the
child's notion of causality. These two questions of what
reahty and causahty mean to the child are the subject of
this book and of its sequel.^ It is clear from the outset
that these problems are distinct from those dealt with in

^ La causaliU physique chez I' enfant.
1

2 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

a previous work,^ There the problem was an analysis
of the form and functioning of child thought ; here it is
an analysis of its content. The. two questions though
closely related are in their nature distinguishable. The
form and functioning of thought are manifested every time
the child comes into contact with other children or with
an adult and constitute a form of social behaviour,
observable from without. The content, on the contrary,
may or may not be apparent and varies with the child
and the things of which it is speaking. It is a system of
intimate behefs and it requires a special technique to bring
them to the Ught of day. Above all it is a system of
mental tendencies and predilections of which the child
himself has never been consciously aware and of which
he never speaks.

Hence it is not merely useful but essential, first to
examine the methods to be employed in studying these
beliefs. To judge of the logic of children it is often enough
simply to talk with them or to observe them among them-
selves. To arrive at their beliefs requires a special method
which, it must be confessed outright, is not only difficult
and tedious, but demands also an outlook, the fruit of at
least one or two full years' training. Mental specialists,
trained in clinical practice, will immediately appreciate
the reason. In order to assess a child's statement at its
true worth the most minute precautions are necessary.
Some account of these precautions must now be given,
since if the reader ignores them he is likely to falsify
completely the meaning of the pages which follow and,
moreover, to mismanage the experiments should he, as
we hope, decide to check them by repeating them
himself.

§ I. Method of Tests, Pure Observation and the
Clinical Method. — The first method that presents
itself as a means of solving the given problem is

^ J. Piaget, Studies m Child Logic :

Vol. I. Language and Thought m the Child. Kegan Paul. 1926.
Vol. II. Judgment and Reasoning in the Child. Kegan Paul. 1928.

INTRODUCTION 3

that of tests; that is to say, the method of posmg
questions so arranged as to satisfy the two following
requirements : first, that the question and the con-
ditions in which it is submitted remain the same
for each child, second that each answer be related to
a scale or schedule which serves as a standard of com-
parison both qualitative and quantitative. The advan-
tages of this method are indisputable in diagnosing,
children individually. For general psychology also
the resulting statistics often provide useful information.
But for our particular purpose the test method has two
important defects. Firstly, it does not allow a sulBfiicient
analysis of the results. When working under the stereo-
typed conditions which the test method demands only
rough results can be obtained, which, though interesting
in practice, are too often useless as theory, owing to the
lack of context. This, however, is of sUght importance, for
it is obvious that with sufficient ingenuity, the tests can
be so varied as to reveal all the components of a given
psychological reaction. The essential failure of the test
method in the researches with which we are concerned,
is that it falsifies the natural mental inclination of the
subject or at least risks so doing. For example, in trying
to find out how a child conceives the movement of the
sun and moon the question may be asked, " What makes
the sun move ? " The child perhaps answers, " God
makes it move," or " the wind blows it," etc. Such
answers are not to be neglected, even if they be only
the result of " romancing," that is of that peculiar tend-
ency of children to invent when embarrassed by a given
question. However, even had this test been apphed to
children of all ages, no real advance would have been made,
since it may weU be that a child would never put the
question to itself in such a form or even that it would
never have asked such a question at all. The child may
quite possibly imagine the sun to be a Hving being moving
of its own accord. In asking " what makes the sun move ? "
the suggestion of an outside agent occurs at once, thus

4 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

provoking the creation of a mj^h. Or in asking the
question " How does the sun move ? ' ' one may be suggesting
the idea of " how " — perhaps also not previously present —
thus stimulating fresh myths such as, " the sun moves by
breathing," or " because of the heat," or " it rolls," etc.
The only way to avoid such difficulties is to vary the
questions, to make counter-suggestions, in short, to give
up all idea of a fixed questionnaire.

The same is true in mental pathology. A case of
dementia prcecox may have a sufficient gleam of memory to
state correctly who his father was, though habitually he
beheves himself to be of illustrious parentage. But the real
problem is to know how he frames the question to himself
or if he frames it at all. The skill of the practitioner
consists not in making him answer questions but in making
him talk freely and thus encouraging the flow of his
spontaneous tendencies instead of diverting it into the
artificial channels of set question and answer. It consists
n placing every symptom in its mental context rather
than in abstracting it from its context.

In short, the test method has its uses, but for the
present problem it tends to falsify the perspective by
diverting the child from his natural inclination. It tends
to neglect the spontaneous interests and primitive re-
actions of the child as well as other essential problems.

The question of pure observation next arises. Obser-
vation must be at once the starting point of all research
dealing with child thought and also the final control on
the experiments it has inspired. In the ease of the present
research it is the observation of the spontaneous questions
of children which furnishes data of the highest importance.
The detailed study of the contents of these questions
reveals the interests of children at different ages and
reveals to us those questions which the child is revolving
in its own mind and which might never have occurred to
us, or which we should never have framed in such terms.
Further, a study of the exact form of the questions in-
dicates the child's imphcit solutions, for almost every

INTRODUCTION 5

question contains its solution in the manner in which it
is asked. For example, when a child asks " who made the
sun ? " it is clear he thinks of the sun as the product of
an act of creation. Or again, when a child asks why there
are two Mount Sal^ves, the big Sal^ve and the little
Saleve, when there are not two Matterhoms, he evidently
imagines mountains as arranged according to a plan which
excludes all chance.

We may thus state the first rule of our method. When
a particular group of explanations by children is to be
investigated, the questions we shall ask them will be
determined in matter and in form, by the spontaneous
questions actually asked by children of the same age or
younger. It is also imf>ortant, before drawing conclusions
from the results of an investigation, to seek corroboration
in a study of the spontaneous questions of children. It
can then be seen whether the notions ascribed to them
do or do not correspond with the questions they them-
selves ask and the manner in which they ask them.

For example, we shall study later in this voliune the
question of animism in children. We shall see that when
questioned as to whether the sun, etc., is alive, knows,
feels, etc., children at a certain age reply in the affirmative.
But is this a spontaneous notion or is it a reply suggested
directly or indirectly by the question ? To solve this we
must search for an indication among collections of
children's questions, where we shall find that a certain
child of six and a half, Del (see Language and Thought,
Chapter I, §8), on seeing a ball rolling in the direction of
the observer asked spontaneously, " Does it know you're
there ? " We also see that Del asked a great number of
questions in order to find out whether an object, such as
a leaf, was inanimate or ahve. Further, we see that Del,
in answer to the statement that dead leaves are certainly
dead, retorted " but they move with the wind ! " [ibid.,
§8). Thus some children by the form of their questions
show that they connect life with movement. These facts
show that an interrogatory on animism, undertaken in

6 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

such a way (for example by asking in the manner of Del
if a moving object " knows " that it is moving), is not
artificial and that the connection between life and move-
ment corresponds to something spontaneous in the child.

But if the necessity for direct observation is thus made
clear its drawbacks are also obvious. The method of pure
observation is not only tedious and seemingly unable to
guarantee the quaUty of the results, except at the expense
of their quantity (it is, in fact, impossible to observe a
large number of children under similar conditions), but
also it seems to contain certain systematic defects the two
chief of which are as follows.

In the first place, the child's intellectual egocentricity
constitutes a serious obstacle to knowing him by pure
observation unaided by questions. We have, in fact,
attempted to show elsewhere {Language and Thought,
Chapters I-II) that the child neither spontaneously seeks nor
is able to communicate the whole of his thought. Further,
if in the society of other children, the conversation may
be associated with his immediate activity or play, thus
giving no clue to that essential fragment of his thought
which is not concerned with action and which develops
by being in touch with vaiious adult activities or with
nature. In this case conceptions of the world and of
ph5r^cal causality wiU appear not to interest him at all.
Or again, if in the society of adults, he may ask questions
interminably but without ever seeking explanations of his
own. These he withholds at first because he feels they
must be known to every one, then, later, from shame, from
fear of being wrong and from fear of disillusion. He is
silent about them especially because he regards these
explanations, being his own, as not only the most natural
but also as the only ones possible. In short, even that
which could be explained in words, ordinarily remains
imphcit, simply because the child's thought is not so
socialised as our own. But alongside of those thoughts
which can be expressed, at least internally, how many
inexpressible thoughts must remain unknown so long as

INTRODUCTION 7

we restrict ourselves to observing the child without
talking to him ? By inexpressible thoughts are meant
tendencies of mind, syncretic schemas, both visual and
motor, in short, all those primitive associations whose
existence one feels directly one starts talking with a child.
These primitive associations are of the greatest importance,
and to bring them to hght special methods must be
employed.

The second drawback to the method of pure observation
is the difficulty of distinguishing a child's play from his
behefs. Take the example of a child, who, imagining
himself to be alone, says to the roller : " Have you
flattened out all those big stones ? " Is he playing or does
he really personify the machine ? In a particular case
it is impossible to judge with conviction. Pure obser-
vation is inadequate for distinguishing belief from
romancing. The only valid criteria, as we shall see later,
are based on multiplicity of results and on the comparison
of individual reactions.

It is therefore essential to go beyond the method of
pure observation and without faUing into the pitfalls of
the test method, to take full advantage of what may be
gained from experiment. With this in view we shall use a
third method which claims to unite what is most expedient
in the methods of test and of direct observation, whilst
avoiding their respective disadvantages : this is the
method of clinical examination, used by psychiatrists as
a means of diagnosis. For example, one may for months
examine certain cases of parancea without once seeing the
idea of grandeur assert itself, though the impression of it
is behind every unusual reaction. Moreover, though there
are not differentiated tests for every type of morbid
condition, yet the practitioner is able both to talk freely
with the patient whilst watching carefully for evidences
of morbid obsession, and furthermore to lead him gently
towards the critical zones (birth, race, fortune, military
rank or pohtical standing, mystic life, etc.) naturally
without knowing exactly where the obsession may suddenly

8 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

crop up, but constantly maintaining the conversation on
fertile soil. The clinical examination is thus exi)erimental
in the sense that the practitioner sets himself a problem,
makes h5rpotheses, adapts the conditions to them and
finally controls each hypothesis by testing it against the
reactions he stimulates in conversation. But the clinical
examination is also dependent on direct observation, in
the sense that the good practitioner lets himself be led,
though always in control, and takes account of the whole
of the mental context, instead of being the victim of
" systematic error " as so often happens to the pure
experimenter.

Since the clinical method has rendered such important
service in a domain where formerly all was disorder and
confusion, child psychology would make a great mistake
to neglect it. There is in fact no reason, ^ priori, why
children should not be questioned on those points where
pure observation leaves the research in doubt. The
recognition by the psj^chologist of mythomania and of
suggestibihty in the child, and of the fallacies these
bring in their train, affords no ground why he should not
question the child for the purpose of determining precisely,
by cHnical examination, the exact part which suggestion
and romancing play in the answers.

It is unnecessary to quote examples here, since the
following work is principally a collection of clinical
observations. It is true that in the nature of things we
shall be compelled to schematise our cases, not by sum-
marising them (which would be to misrepresent them),
but by taking from reports of conversation only those
passages which have a direct interest. From many pages
of notes taken in every case we shall thus record only a
few lines. It has also not been thought useful to give here
complete examples of examinations, since the cUnical
method can only be learned by long practice. Moreover,
it is our opinion that in child psychology as in patho-
logical psychology, at least a year of daily practice is
necessary before passing beyond the inevitable fumbling

INTRODUCTION 9

stage of the beginner. It is so hard not to talk too much
when questioning a child, especially for a pedagogue ! It
is so hard not to be suggestive ! And above all, it is so
hard to find the middle course between systematisation due
to preconceived ideas and incoherence due to the absence
of any directing hypothesis ! The good experimenter
must, in fact, unite two often incompatible quahties ; he
must know how to observe, that is to say, to let the child
talk freely, without ever checking or side-tracking his
utterance, and at the same time he must constantly be
alert for something definitive, at every moment he must
have some working hypothesis, some theory, true or false,
which he is seeking to check. To appreciate the real
difi&culty of the chnical method one must have taught it.
When students begin they either suggest to the child all
they hope to find, or they suggest nothing at all, because
they are not on the look-out for anything, in which case,
to be sure, they will never find anything.

In short, it is no simple task, and the material it yields
needs subjecting to the strictest criticism. The psycho-
logist must in fact make up for the uncertainties in the
method of interrogation by sharpening the subtleties of
his interpretation. But, here again, the beginner is
threatened by two opposing dangers, those of attributing
either its maximum or its minimum value to everything
the child says. The greatest enemies of the clinical
method are those who unduly simplify the results of an
interrogatory, those who either accept every answer the
child makes as pure gold or those on the other hand who
class all as dross. The first, naturally, are the more
dangerous, but both fall into the same error, that is, of
supposing that everything a child may say, during a
quarter, half or three-quarters of an hour of conversation,
hes on the same psychological level — that of considered
belief, for example, or of romancing, etc.

The essence of the critical method is, on the contrary,
to separate the wheat from the tares and to keep every
answer in its mental context. For the context may be

10 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

one of reflection or of spontaneous belief, of play or of
prattle, of effort and interest or of fatigue ; and above
all there are certain subjects who inspire confidence right
from the beginning, who can be seen to reflect and consider,
and there are others of whom one feels equally certain
that they pay no heed to the questions and only talk
rubbish in their replies.

It is impossible to state here the precise rules for the
diagnosis of these individual reactions, this must be the
result of practice. But to render more intelligible the way
in which the following observations were chosen from
amongst all those at our disposal (for this volume more than
600 observations were collected by the author and on many
special points our collaborators further examined a large
number of subjects), we shall attempt to classify in certain
broad categories the various possible types of answer. As
these types are of very unequal value it is important to
bear in mind a clear outhne of this classification, so as to
be able to assign due value to the interpretations.

§ 2. The Five Types of Reaction Revealed by
Clinical Examination. — When the child appears un-
interested in the question and is not stimulated to
any effort of adaptation, it repHes at random and
whatever first comes into its head, without so much
as trying to find fun in it or to invent an answer.
We shall speak of this reaction as the answer at random
(called by Binet and Simon " le n importequisme "). When
the child, without further reflection, leplies to the question
by inventing an answer in which he does not really believe,
or in which he beheves merely by force of saying it, we
shall speak of romancing. When the child makes an effort
to reply to the question but either the question is suggestive
or the child is simply trying to satisfy the examiner
without attempting to think for himself, we shall use the
term suggested conviction. We shall include perseveration
under this head when it is the result of the questions being
in a suggestive series. In other cases perseveration must be
regarded as a form of the " answer at random." When

INTRODUCTION ii

the child repUes after reflection, drawing the answer from
the stores of his own mind, without suggestion, although
the question is new to him, we shall say there is liberated con-
viction. The Hberated conviction is necessarily influenced
by the examination, since the particular way in which
the question is worded and presented to the child forces
it to reason along a certain hne and to systematise its
knowledge in a particular manner, but none the less it is
an original product of the child's thought, since neither
the reasoning it performs in order to answer the question
nor the sum total of the previous knowledge on which
it draws during its reflection are directly influenced by
the experimenter. The liberated conviction is thus,
strictly speaking, neither spontaneous nor suggested ; it
is the result of reasoning, performed to order, but by
means of original material (previous knowledge, mental
images, motor schemas, syncretic associations, etc.) and
original logical instruments (method of reasoning, natural
tendencies of mind, intellectual habits, etc.). Finally,
when the child has no need of reasoning to answer the
question, but can give an answer forthwith because
already formulated or capable of being formulated, there
is spontaneous conviction. There is thus spontaneous
conviction when the problem is not new to the child and
when the reply is the result of a previous original reflection.
We shall naturally exclude from this type of reaction, as
from the preceding, answers influenced by teaching received
previous to the examination. This involves a separate and
naturally very complex problem, which consists in distin-
guishing from among the answers received those that are
the child's own and those that are drawn from its adult
environment. We shall reconsider this question later.
For the moment we are concerned with more clearly
distinguishing the five types of reaction just enumerated,
and shall start with the last.

That the cUnical examination reveals the existence of
spontaneous convictions and aids the chOd in formulating
them for himself is incontestable. These convictions are

12 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

rare, in the sense that they are the hardest to arrive at,
but they nevertheless exist. We shall see, for example,
that boys of an average age of 8 can give a correct des-
cription in words and a complete diagram of the mechanism
of a bicycle. It is evident that such a result and such a
synchronism in individual answers point to reflection
previous to the examination, even were there no evidence
of children asking questions concerning the details of a
bicycle. We shall also see that it is enough to ask children
of 6-8, " What is the sun doing while you are walking ? "
to be told without more ado that the sim and moon
follow them, moving and stopping when they do. The
constancy of these answers and the spontaneity of the
statement compared with the vague nature of the question
undoubtedly mark the spontaneous conviction, that is to
say a conviction estabUshed before the question was asked.
But it is not so much the existence of the spontaneous
conviction that the reader will feel inclined to dispute
as the boundary line to be distinguished between the
spontaneous and the hberated conviction. It is true that
one frequently experiences the impression that a question
set to a child is one that it has never yet given a thought
to, and yet the unexpected originality of the reply seems
to indicate previous reflection. How is the line of de-
marcation to be fixed ? For instance we may ask a child,
" Where does night come from ? " In such a form, the
question contains no suggestion. The child hesitates,
tries to avoid the question and finally replies that it is
big black clouds which make night. Is this a spontaneous
conviction or is it rather that the child, having never
considered such a question, seeks an answer in the simplest
hj^xjthesis, and one making the least demand on the
imagination ? Either interpretation can be advanced.
Both are probably true. Certain children on being asked
why the clouds appear, answer, " to make it night." In
such cases the explanation of the clouds by the night is
clearly spontaneous. In other cases one has the impression
that the child is inventing his explanation on the spot ?

INTRODUCTION 13

It is interesting to observe that in such a case the spon-
taneous conviction coincides with the liberated conviction,
but it is obvious that in general and even in this particular
case they have not the same value for the psychologist.

It is naturally quite useless to ask children if they have
ever thought about the question asked. Either from lack
of memory or of introspection, they are quite unable
to say.

But the question whether it is possible in every case to
distinguish the spontaneous conviction from the Uberated
conviction is not very important. The study of the
liberated conviction is however of the greatest interest. It
is important to insist on this, since it is essential to our
scheme. It is a question of fact beyond challenge by any
theoretical argmnent that the hberated conviction shows
the same uniformity as the spontaneous conviction.

For example, we made the following simple experiment :
a stone was dropi)ed into a glass half full of water placed
in front of a child who was asked why the level of the
water rose. The answers given expressed a Hberated
conviction in the majority of cases, that is to say in those
cases where the child was not already aware that the level
of the water would rise when the stone was dropped in.
All the children under 9 declared that the water rose
because the stone was " heavy," and the rest of the
experiment showed that they did not consider the volume
of the object but only its weight. Here then is a solution
arrived at on the spot but showing a remarkable uni-
formity amongst different children. In this work will be
found a multitude of other examples showing the uni-
formity of the hberated conviction.

We thus see that even when the solution is invented
by the child during the experiment itself, it is not invented
from nothing. It impUes previously formed schemas,
tendencies of mind, intellectual habits, etc. The golden
ru'e is to avoid suggestion, that is to say to avoid dictating
a particular answer among aU the possible answers. But
on the assumption that the Hberated conviction can be

14 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

distinguished from the spontaneous conviction the former
are worth serious study, for they reveal, if nothing more,
the child's mental predilections.

Let us take another example. A child asked us, " Who
made the sun ? " We took this question and put it to a
number of httle children in the non-suggestive form :
" How did the sun begin ? " All the children declared
that men had made it. Let us suppose this to be a mere
invention of the moment and that the children had never
before thought of such a question. There is here a
solution which, in the first place, every child chose in
preference to a number of others, and in the second place
which they refused to set aside even under the pressure
of our counter-suggestions. It seems then probable that
this artificialist answer, even if of the liberated type, is
connected with a latent artificialism, an artificiahst
tendency of mind natural to children. Naturally this
remains to be proved but good grounds are afforded for
stating the problem thus. Moreover, the child would not
abandon his hypothesis during the remainder of the ex-
amination notwithstanding our attempts to make him.
This gives a second indication showing that natural tend-
encies at variance with this actificialist attitude are slight.
Otherwise it would be easy to make the child alter his view,
to make him invent something else, etc.

In short, the study of the Hberated conviction is cer-
tainly a justifiable one. The method consists of questioning
the child on all his surroundings. The hypothesis is the
assertion that the child invents his explanations in such
a way as to reveal something of the spontaneous tendencies
of his mind. In order to obtain any results by this method
it must naturally be checked by a rigorous control, both
as regards the manner of asking the questions and the
interpretation of the answers. These rules we shall
presently seek to formulate.

If the line of demarcation between the hberated and
the spontaneous conviction is of only relative importance
it is on the contrary absolutely necessary clearly to

INTRODUCTION 15

distinguish the liberated conviction from the suggested
conviction. It must not be thought that suggestion is
easily avoided. A long apprenticeship is necessary before
one can learn to recognise and avoid the numerous forms
of suggestion possible. Two varieties are particularly
dangerous, verbal suggestion and suggestion by perseveration.

The former is easily distinguished in general but is very
difficult to detect in detail. The only means of avoiding it
is to learn children's talk and to frame the questions in
this language. It is thus necessary when beginning an
inquiry on a new topic to make the children talk first,
simply as a means of acquiring a vocabulary that avoids
aU suggestion. Without so doing it is impossible to foresee
the far-reaching effects that some apparently inoffensive
word may occasion. For example, such words as " going
along," "walking," "moving" (" avancer," "marcher,"
" bouger ") are certainly not synonyms to a child. The
sun goes along but it does not move, etc. If one carelessly
uses a particular word that is unexpected to the child,
one risks stimulating, simply by suggestion, animistic or
anthropomorphic reactions which might then be mistaken
for spontaneous.

Suggestion due to perseveration is still harder to avoid,
for the simple fact of continuing the conversation after
the child's first answer tends to make him perseverate
along the line he has already adopted. Further, any set
examination arranged in series tends to cause persevera-
tion. For example, to ask a child if a fish, a bird, the sun,
the moon, the clouds, the wind, etc., are alive is to urge
him to say " Yes " to all, simply by force of example. In
such a case the answers are evidently " suggested " and
certainly not " hberated " in the sense in which we are
using the term.

The suggested conviction is of no interest to the psycho-
logist. Whilst the liberated conviction reveals habits of
mind formed previous to the examination although
systematised under its influence, the suggested conviction
reveals nothing beyond the child's suggestibihty, which

i6 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

has no bearing on the conceptions it forms of the
world.

One would Uke to be able to rule out romancing with
the same severity. But the question of romancing is one
of the most delicate raised by the clinical study of the
child. When the questions are set to children, especially
to those of less than 7 or 8 years, it often happens that,
looking perfectly candid and serious the while, they
merely make fun of the question and invent an answer
simply because they like the sound of it. The solution,
in this case, is not suggested, since it is completely free
and unexpected, and yet it is not to be classed with the
Uberated conviction for the simple reason that it is not
a conviction. The child is simply playing and if he comes
to beUeve what he says it is merely by force of saying it
and in the same way as he believes in his games, for the
sole reason that he wants to believe in them. But the
exact significance of this romancing is a very delicate
question. There are three possible solutions. The first
consists in comparing the romancing to what in a normal
adult one would call " rotting." The child makes up the
answer to make fun of the psychologist and principally to
avoid having to think more about a question which he
finds both dull and tiring. This is certainly the correct
interpretation in the majority of the cases — which are
however more or less rare — found after the age of 8. But
it does not explain all the cases before the age of 7 or 8
and there are two other possible solutions.

The second solution compares romancing with the
mjrthomania of the hysteric. The child thus invents, not
so much to laugh at the world as because this is a natural
process of his thought, and in the case of problems he
finds tiresome, the most useful one. According to this
second solution the child is partly taken in by it himself,
and romances on his own account, as for instance when
he resolves for himself some private problem of his own.
This is certainly often the case with small children of
about 4 or 5. Every one is famihar with the rhetorical

INTRODUCTION 17

questions small children ask aloud and to which they
immediately supply the answer themselves. Nagy^
quotes the following question, " Why have bears got four
feet ? " to which the child at once repUed : " Because
they've been naughty and God has punished them."
This is both pure monologue and romance.

Seen in this hght romancing has some interest. It
explains the solutions a child will give when it can find
no better, and thus serves as an indication, negative it is
true, but none the less often useful. It is in this sense
that romancing answers from children of 4-6 will some-
times be quoted in the course of this work. But it is
obvious that care must be taken not to draw from such
facts more than a negative indication. The study of
romancing as such yields nothing like the wealth of
material to be found in the study of the hberated conviction.

Finally, according to the third solution, it is possible
that romancing contains traces of earlier convictions or
more rarely anticipations of a future one. When we are
in the process of rehnquishing a cherished conviction by
progressive stages we often as it were still play with it,
sympathetically, yet without any longer beheving in it.
So, allowing for the different circumstances, the child's
romancing sometimes plays a similar rdle. In discussing
artificiaUsm (Chapter XI, § 4), we shall see the half mythical
romance of a mentally deficient who imagines his parents
to have been present at the beginning of the world. This
myth embodies the remains of the small child's belief in
the onmipotence of its parents.

The problem is exceedingly complex and from the
beginning of our research we must be especially careful
not to prejudge the nature of romancing. It is interesting
in so far as it does not for the child bear the same relation
to conviction as it does for us. We must therefore
study it. But it is necessary, whatever our aim in studying
it, to distinguish it carefully from the liberated conviction.

^ Nagy, " Die Entwicklung des Interesses," Zeiischrift f. exp. Pdd.
Vol. V, 1907.

i8 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

In the following section an attempt vvdll be made to give
certain criteria by which this may be done.

The answer at random still remains to be dealt v.Hth.
If the question " What do 3 and 3 make ? " be asked
a deficient or a child not yet old enough to know, the
answer given is a bUnd shot such as 4 or 10 or 100. In
fact the chUd seldom makes no answer and prefers in-
venting one to remaining silent. This is not romancing
for there is no systematisation in the invention nor does
the child take any interest in it. The child romances to
amuse itself ; the " answer at random " on the other hand
arises from lack of interest.

From the above classification of the different types of
possible answer we may remark the following. The
spontaneous convictions, that is to say those formed
previous to the examination, are the most interesting.
The liberated conviction is instructive in so far as it
reveals the child's natural trend of mind. Romancing
sometimes gives indications — though principally negative
— and provided it is interpreted with the necessary
prudence. Finally, suggested conviction and the answer
at random are to be severely rejected, the former since
they only show what the experimenter wanted the child
to express and the latter since they merely reveal the
subject's lack of comprehension.

§ 3. Rules and Criteria for the Diagnosis of the
Preceding Types of Reaction. — Having made clear
the object of our research, we shall now attempt to
frame certain rules as guides in the selection of the
most interesting answers. In other words we shall try
and elucidate the practical means of distinguishing the
five types of reaction characterised in ahstracto in the
preceding section.

In the first place, how is the suggested conviction to be
distinguished from the answer at random ? The suggested
conviction is essentially momentary. A counter-suggestion
made not necessarily at once but after a short lapse is
sufficient to destroy it ; or it is enough merely to let the

INTRODUCTION 19

child talk for a few minutes and then to question it again
indirectly on the same subject : the suggested conviction
is like a parasite in the child's mind, which tends naturally
to rid itself of the foreign matter.

But this first criterion is not enough. Certain children
are particularly susceptible and change their opinions
so readily on every subject that it is impossible to rely
on these oscillations as a guide. The method is then to
pursue the examination more closely. The characteristic
of suggested convictions is their lack of connection with
the subject's other convictions, and also their dissimilarity
with the convictions of other children of the same age
and class. This yields two supplementary rules. In the
first place, to probe all around the suspect answer to see
whether or not its roots are solid, and then to ask the
question under as many different guises as possible.
Suggestion may thus be avoided by means of patience
and analysis.

These three criteria will a fortiori serve to exclude the
answer at random, which is much more unstable even
than the suggested conviction. As regards the answer at
random and romancing, they are easily distinguished even
independently of the context : romancing is much richer
and more systematised, the answer at random being more
in the nature of a blind alley.

The suggested answer and the answer at random being now
recognisable we must next define the criteria for romancing.
Of the three preceding rules, two are useless for its detec-
tion. Firstly, counter-suggestion is no weapon against it
because the romancer resists the contradictor and romances
all the harder the more pressing the objections by which
he is opposed. Secondly, the analysis of the roots of the
given answer is dif&cult, precisely because romancing is
always so rich in its ramifications that it can appear under
the deceptive guise of being sohdly ensconced in a setting
of systematic convictions. Unlike suggestion, romancing
is very difficult to recognise in an isolated case. The only
method of tracking it down is to multiply cases. In

20 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

dealing with a large number of subjects, romancing may
be distinguished from the liberated and the spontaneous
convictions by means of the three following criteria.

By questioning a large number of children of the same
age one finds either that the suspected answer is very
general or else that it is pecuUar to one or two given
children. In the first case the chances are against the
Ukelihood of romancing. In fact, since it is both a free
and an individual form of invention it is most improbable
that all the children would invent in the same way when
answering the same question. But this first criterion is not
enough because it is quite possible that a certain question
is completely incomprehensible at a given age and can
only give rise to romancing. Further, in such a case,
romancing may tend to move along an obvious Une, thus
giving rise to uniformity. This interpretation is particu-
larly applicable where artificiaUsm is concerned. For
example, children of 4 to 6 are questioned as to how the
moon began. Suppose them to find the question incom-
prehensible, they will then invent a myth and as the
simplest is to have recourse to man they will all say " a
man made it." We clearly need a more subtle criterion.

There seems to be a second one at hand. Where a
large number of children of different ages are questioned
it may be that the suspected answer (which is by hypo-
thesis generally in the lowest ages) will disappear entirely
at a certain age level and give place to quite another type
of answer. The children in this case could be divided into
two stages, without an intermediary stage. On the
contrary, it may be that the particular answer disappears
progressively and gives place to a maturer ty|>e of answer
only as the climax of a continuous development. Then the
children must be divided into three divisions, two extreme
stages and an intermediary stage. It is clear that in the
latter case the chances of romancing are much less than
in the former. For suppose that on a certain question
children start with systematic opinions or a strong natural
tendency and this opinion is subsequently brought into

INTRODUCTION 21

conflict with experience or teaching then it is evident that
adaptation to the new point of view will not be instan-
taneous but progressive. On the contrary, the absence of
intermediaries between two successive groups of answers
would certainly seem to indicate that the first group had
no value in the eyes of the child and would thus seem to
favour a hypothesis of the general existence of romancing
during the first stage.

Finally, a third criterion may profitably be studied :
the method of arriving at the right answer. In fact if
the answers given by the youngest children examined
are not romancing, not only ought the disappearance of
these answers to be progressive and not sudden, where the
children are classified in groups according to their average
ages, but also it should be possible to observe the primitive
conceptions still chnging to the first correct answers
themselves. In other words, if in a given process three
stages can be distinguished one of which is intermediary,
the type of answer of the first stage ought to be stiU
traceable, not only during the second stage, but right to
the beginning of the third. In such a case, it is practically
certain that the answers belonging to the first stage do
not result from romancing.

Let us take an example. Children in the first stage
maintain that the Lake of Geneva was dug by workmen
who filled it with water. Children in the second stage still
maintain that the lake was dug, but the water has come
from the mountains, and originates from rain itself.
Finally, in a third stage the child admits that the lake was
made according to a natural law, the rivers hollowed it
out and feed it with water. We can conclude that the
artificialist answers of the first stage are not romancing,
for not only are they general, and not only does the
existence of the second stage show that the artificiaUsm
does not disappear immediately, but also children are
found at the beginning of the third stage who still beUeve
that Geneva existed before the lake and that the lake is
beside the town " because you must have the town before

22 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the lake." The beginning of the third stage thus still
shows the persistence of the artificiahst trend of mind.

In conclusion, it is clear that it is comparatively easy
to distinguish genuine conviction from romancing. The
astonishing resemblance of children amongst one another
— at any rate of civihsed children, of whatever social class,
country or language — makes it possible to see fairly
rapidly whether a particular conviction is general, lasting,
and even capable of resisting the first adult lessons.

On the contrary, it is difficult — and, curiously, this is
the only real difficulty we encountered in appl5dng the
method — to distinguish the spontaneous conviction from
the liberated conviction amongst the answers obtained.
As has already been pointed out : (i) Both resist sugges-
tion ; (2) the roots of both he buried deep in the thought
of the subject under examination ; (3) in both a wide
generahty of ideas occurs in children of the same age ; (4)
both last several years, decreasing progressively rather
than being suddenly abandoned ; and finally traces of both
are still to be found interwoven with the first correct
answers, that is to say with answers depending on the
pressure of adult environment.

Are all answers then which satisfy these five conditions
to be regarded as due to the child's spontaneous con-
victions ? In other words, shall we admit that every-
thing the child says which passes these tests has been
formulated in its thought, previous to the examination ?
It goes without saying that this is not the case. The only
means of distinguishing the spontaneous from the hberated
is by having recourse to pure observation. It is here that
every inquiry must end, just as observation must be the
inspiration from which every research starts. The study
of questions asked by children themselves is in this respect
of the greatest help.

But this method is, as we have already shown, very
limited in its use. On many points where the answers
obtained by the chnical method seem to be highly
systematised, children ask few if any questions. This is

INTRODUCTION 23

often precisely because the convictions disclosed by the
clinical examinations have never previously been doubted
and have thus never provided matter for question. But
in such a case, it is not so much a matter of convictions as
of tendencies, imphcit in the child's natural trend of mind
rather than expHcitly formulated. They are points of
view that remain subconscious, and undefined motive
influences rather than conceptions. How then is the
spontaneous conviction or tendency to be distinguished
from the hberated conviction ? The rules for the clinical
examination cannot furnish the solution. It is to be
sought rather in the rules for interpretation in general and
it is to these we must now turn.

§ 4. Rules for the Interpretation of the
Results. — In psychology as in physics there are no pure
" facts," if by " facts " are meant phenomena presented
nakedly to the mind by nature itself, independent respec-
tively of hypotheses by means of which the mind examines
them, of principles governing the interpretation of ex-
perience, and of the systematic framework of existing
judgments into which the observer pigeon-holes every new
observation. We must therefore defme at least the general
principles which are to guide us in interpreting the
children's answers to our questions. Otherwise the reader
will be raising mistaken difficulties from the outset — such
for example as, What natural trend of mind leads the
child to certain replies rather than to others when the
reaction is of the liberated type ? What part does the
adult play in the child's convictions, etc.^

But the contrary danger of prejudging the nature of
the results before they have themselves been analysed,
must also be avoided. The important thing is to find a
number of rules of interpretation which will unite the
maximum of flexibility with the maximum of strictness,
in so far as these two requisites can be reconciled. Put
more simply, we must find out what rules must be followed
to avoid the dangers of premature judgment.

In this connection two points are of especial import-

24 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

ance. The first concerns the relation between the verbal
formula or conscious systematisation the child gives to
its beliefs at the moment of the examination, and the
preconscious trend of mind which has urged the child to
invent, in whole or in part, a particular solution. For
example a child gives an answer which is clearly hberated,
that is to say, that we can as it were see the conviction
forming under our eyes. Is this answer to be treated as if
it was of the " spontaneous " type, or should we rather
interpret it by taking account not so much of the actual
answer as it stands, as of the tendencies which guided the
child in its search ? But in this case how is the choice to be
made and how are these tendencies of the child to be
interpreted without distorting them ? The question is of
extreme importance, in fact the whole value of the clinical
method depends on its solution.

There are two conflicting alternatives. The first is that
of certain child psychologists who reject, as devoid of
significance, all results determined strictly by question
and answer (though naturally only so far as such an ex-
amination aims at revealing the child's convictions and
conceptions and not simply subjecting it to scholastic or
mental tests). For these authors every examination tends
to falsify perspective and pure observation alone provides
an objective standpoint. But to so reserved a view the
fact may always be opposed that the results of examinations
are constant, at least on an average. When children are
questioned as to the meaning of thinking or of names, all
the youngest (or at least a sufficiently high number to
warrant the word " all ") reply that thinking is with the
mouth and that words or names reside in the things, etc.
Such uniformity confronts the detractors of the method
of examination and justifies, without further grounds, the
continuation of this means of research.

The alternative solution is that of those psychologists
who regard every answer, or at any rate every " hberated "
answer (in opposition to those which come from suggestion,
romancing, or want of reflection), as being the expression

INTRODUCTION 25

of the child's spontaneous thought. This is what certain
contributors to the Pedagogical Seminary seem to hold for
example. If these authors are to be believed it is enough
to set a number of questions to children and to coUect
their answers to obtain " children's ideas " or " child
theories," etc. Without wishing in the least to mis-
represent the value and interest of many of these inquiries,
we think none the less that this value is often something
quite other than what the authors suppose. In other words
we regard as very doubtful the principle according to
which no matter what answer, so long as it be neither
suggested nor the fruit of romancing, possesses the same
coefficient of spontaneity as the answer of a normal adult,
given in the course of an examination, or as a child's
original conviction observed without interference or
examination. It is true that such a principle may give
rise to certain accurate conclusions, but only by chance,
just as truth may often issue from what is false. As a
general principle it is altogether erroneous, and it is
alarming to think of the exaggerations that would result
from questioning children on a number of subjects and
regarding the answers thus obtained as being all of
equal value, and as revealing equally the child's
mentality.

These considerations point the way to the rule of the
just mean : to regard every Uberated conviction as an
index, and to seek by means of this index the trend of
mind that is thus revealed. This research itself may be
guided by the following principle. Observation shows
that the child's thought has Uttle systematisation, httle
coherence, is not in general deductive, is for the most part
untroubled by the need of avoiding contradiction, juxta-
poses statements rather than S5mthesises them and accepts
syncretic schemas without feehng the need to analyse. In
other words, the child's thought more nearly resembles
a sum total of inclinations resulting from both action and
reverie (play combining these two processes, which are
the simplest to yield organic satisfaction) than it resembles

26 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the self-conscious and systematic thought of the adult.
Therefore, to arrive at the trend of mind by a Uberated
conviction, the principle is to strip this conviction of every
systematic element.

To achieve this, the influence of the question set must
first be discounted, that is to say one must abstract from
the child's answer the fact that it is an answer. For
example, if one asks " how did the sun begin ? " and the
child rephes " men made it " the only indication to be
retained is that there exists for the child a vague connec-
tion between the sun and men, or that men count for
something in the nature of the sun. If to the questions
" how did the names of things begin ? " and " where are
the names ? " the child answers that the names come from
the things themselves and are in things, all we may conclude
is that for the child names belong more to objects than to
the subject who thinks of them and that the child is realist
from its natural trend of mind. Care must be taken in
these two examples not to claim for the child a spon-
taneous inclination to state the origin of the sun and moon
(unless pure observation shows such) nor a concern as to
the place of names. The only information that the answer
yields is so to speak the direction towards which it points,
an artificialist direction as regards the first example, and
a realist direction as regards the second.

Next the answers obtained must be stripped of all
logical character and care taken not to introduce an
artificial coherence where coherence is of an organic rather
than a logical character. Thus children will answer that
the sun, the moon, the sky, the night are made of clouds
and that the clouds are of smoke. The lightning and the
stars are of fire which comes from the smoke, etc. A
delightful system, according to which the smoke from the
chimney is the principle of meteorology and astronomy !
Only it does not happen to be a system. The connecting
links are only partly realised, half formulated and sketched
in the rough rather than clearly outHned. Further, these
associations do not exclude others, and others that seem

INTRODUCTION 27

to us to contradict them — thus the child may conceive
these same objects as hving and conscious, etc.

Finally, an attempt must be made to strip the answers
of their verbal element. There is certainly present to the
child a whole world of thought, incapable of formulation
and made up of images and motor schemas combined.
Out of it issue, at least partially, ideas of force, life, weight,
etc., and the relations of objects amongst themselves are
penetrated with these indefinable associations. When the
child is questioned he translates his thought into words,
but these words are necessarily inadequate. Thus the
child says it is the sun which " makes " the clouds move.
Is this to be taken as meaning that the sun attracts or
repels the clouds, or that it chases them as a poUceman
chases a thief and thus " makes " them run away ? Either
is possible. But, here again, the important thing is the
attitude rather than the formula, the direction of the
thought rather than the answer given.

Briefly, the principle for the interpretation of the
liberated answer, and also in part for the spontaneous
answer, is to regard these answers as symptoms rather
than as realities. But where draw the hne in this critical
elimination ? Pure observation must decide. If a large
number of children's questions are examined and the
answers obtained by clinical examination compared with
these spontaneous questions, it will be seen in what
measure a certain trend of thought corresponds with
questions systematically asked. Thus, as regards arti-
ficiaUsm, but little observation will show that the connec-
tion between men and things often assumes spontaneously
in the child the relation of maker to thing made : the
child spontaneously asks certain questions concerning
origin and asks them in such a way as to imply from the
start the notion that it is men who have made or contri-
buted towards making the things.

But the above rules will not suffice to resolve all the
problems involved in the interpretation of the answers.
Unfortunately the study of the child raises a much more

28 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

serious difficulty, that of distinguishing from among the
results of the examination the part to be regarded as the
child's original contribution and that due to previous
adult influences.

Put in this form the problem is insoluble. It involves,
in fact, two quite distinct questions. The history of the
child's intellectual development is largely the history of
the progressive sociaUsation of its individual thought, at
first resisting adaptation to social conditions, then be-
coming increasingly penetrated by surrounding adult
influences. In this respect all the child's thought is
destined, from the commencement of language, to be
absorbed progressively in adult thought. Here arises the
first problem. What is the evolution of this socialisation ?
From the fact that there is progressive sociaUsation it
follows that throughout the whole course of the child's
development, the contents of its thought fall into two
categories : one due to adult influence and the other to
the child's original reactions. In other words, the child's
convictions are the product of a reaction influenced but
not dictated by the adult. This reaction certainly merits
a study and will be treated during the course of this work.
For the present it is enough to reahse that there are three
factors in the problem ; namely, the world to which the
child adapts itself, the child's own world of thought and
the adult society which influences this thought. But, on
the other hand there are two very different types of con-
viction among children which need to be distinguished.
Some are, as we have just seen, influenced but not dictated
by the adult. Others, on the contrary, are simply
swallowed whole, either at school, or from the family, or
from adult conversations which the child overhears, etc.
These naturally have not the shghtest interest. And this
forms the matter of the second problem, the more im-
portant from the point of view of methodology, namely,
how to distinguish those beliefs imposed by the adult and
those showing an original reaction on the part of the child
(a reaction influenced, but not dictated by the adult) ? —

INTRODUCTION 29

It is evident that these two problems need distinguishing.
We must now examine them separately.

As regards the first, two conflicting solutions can be
put forward. According to one, there are no such things
as convictions strictly the child's own ; nothing can be
discerned save traces of stray and incomplete information,
received from without, and to know children's own real
thoughts one would have to bring up orphans on a desert
island. This at heart is the solution imphcit in the work
of many sociologists. The idea that savages can teach us
more than children as to the genesis of human thought,
although the savages are known only at second or third
hand by those qualified to study them scientifically, rests
largely on the tendency to regard the child as entirely
moulded by the surroimding social forces. But it may
weU be that the child's originaUty has been singularly
misunderstood, simply because being egocentric it seeks
neither to convince us of the correctness of its mental
judgments nor above all to become sufficiently conscious
of them to expose them to us. It may well be that we
only see in the child his groping uncertainties precisely
because he does not bother to speak of or even notice
matters which are obvious to him. It is therefore legiti-
mate to refuse to admit d. priori the absolute conformity
of the child's conceptions with those of the world sur-
rounding him. Further, if the logical structure of child
thought differs from our adult logic, as we have sought to
show elsewhere, it seems probable that the content of
child thought is itself partly original.

Must we then adopt the other extreme solution and
make the child a sort of schizoid Uving entirely in its
own automatism, although in appearance sharing in the
life of the social body ? This would be to misrepresent
the fact that the chUd is a being whose principal activity
is adaptation and who is seeking to adapt itself not only
to the adult who surrounds it but to nature itself.

The truth lies surely between the two. Stem, in his
study of child language, has followed a guiding principle

30 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

that we may well adopt, whilst enlarging it in favour of the
originality of child thought. For with children thought
is indeed much more original in its character than is
language. At any rate what Stem says of language is
a fortiori equally true of thought.

Let us admit, says Stem, that in his language the child
limits himself altogether to copying the adult slavishly.
It yet occurs that this copy contains a number of elements
of spontaneity. For, in point of fact, the child does not
copy everything. Its imitation is selective ; certain
features are copied outright, others eliminated after a
period of years. Moreover, the order in which these
imitations are made is practically constant. The gram-
matical categories, for example, are acquired in a fixed
order, etc. But what does imitation, made selectively and
in a fixed order, signify if not a measure of spontaneous
reaction. At any rate such facts point emphatically to
the existence of a structure more or less independent of
external pressure.

But there is yet more. Even that which seems copied
is in reahty deformed and recreated. The words the child
uses, for example, are the same as we use, but they have
a different meaning, either wider or narrower as the case
may be. Associations are different ; S3nitax and style are
original.

Stern thus puts forward on good grounds the hypothesis
that the child digests what it borrows and digests it
according to a mental chemistry of its own. Yet how much
more vahd are these considerations when appUed to the
domain of thought itself, where the role of imitation, as
a formative factor, is evidently much smaller. In fact when
dealing with conceptions we are continually meeting what
one rarely finds in regard to language — a real clash between
the child's thought and its adult surroundings, resulting
in systematic distortion by the child of the information
imparted to it by adults. To appreciate the extent of this
phenomenon one must actually have seen how far children
fail to understand even the best lessons.

INTRODUCTION 31

It may indeed be urged that every language contains
both logic and cosmology and that since the child learns
to speak at the same time or before it learns to think,
its thought will be in terms of the adult social medium.
This is partly true. But from the very fact that, for the
child, adult language is not what a foreign language is to
us (that is to say a system of signs corresponding point for
point with already acquired notions), it is possible to
distinguish between child notions and adult notions simply
by examining the use the child makes of our words and
notions. It will then be seen that adult language con-
stitutes for the child a reality which is often hazy in its
outhnes and that one of the activities of his thought is
to adapt himself to this rcahty, just as he must adapt
himself to physical reality itself. But this adaptation
which characterises the child's verbal thought is original
and presupposes sui generis schemas of mental digestion.
Thus even when a child constructs a particular notion to
correspond to a word of adult language, this notion may
be entirely the child's, in the sense that the word was
originally as hazy to his intelligence as a certain physical
phenomenon might be, and to understand it he had to
deform and assimilate it according to a mental structure
of his own. We shall find an excellent illustration of this
law when studying the child's notion of " life." The
notion of " hving " has been constructed by the child to
correspond to an adult word. But it embraces something
quite other than the adult notion of " hfe " and testifies
to an entirely original conception of the world.

The principle to which we are referring consists then
in regarding the child, not as a being of pure imitation,
but as an organism which assimilates things to itself,
selects them and digests them according to its own
structure. In this way even what is influenced by the
adult may still be original.

It goes without saying that pure imitations and pure
reproductions frequently occur. A child's conviction is
often simply the passive replica of a conversation it has

32 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

heard. Moreover, as the child develops, its comprehension
of the adult increases, and it becomes capable of assimi-
lating the convictions of its associates without deforming
them. How then shaU we distinguish in the results of
the clinical examination the part due to the child itself
and that due to adult conversation which the child has
absorbed ? All the rules already prescribed (§ 3) for
distinguishing the spontaneous and hberated answers from
those due to suggestion during the experiment hold for
the solution of this new problem.

First comes the uniformity of the answers of the same
average age. In fact, if all the children of the same
mental age arrive at the same conception of a given
phenomenon, in defiance of the variations in their personal
circmnstances, their experience and the conversation they
have overheard, etc., this may be regarded as a prime
guarantee of the originahty of the conviction.

Secondly, in so far as the child's convictions follow with
increasing age a continuous evolution, there is fresh pre-
sumption in favour of the originahty of the conviction.

Thirdly, if a particular conviction is really the product
of the child's mind, its disappearance will not be sudden
and it should be possible to estabhsh a number of com-
binations or compromises between it and the new convic-
tion which is tending to supplant it.

Fourthly, a conviction having real sohdarity with a
given mental structure wiU resist suggestion ; and fifthly,
this conviction wiU present a multitude of proUferations
and will react on a number of neighbouring conceptions.

These five criteria, jointly apphed, will suffice to show
whether a particular conviction has been simply borrowed
by the child from adults by passive imitation, or whether
it is in part the product of the child's mental structure.
Manifestly these criteria will no longer reveal the product
of adult teaching at the age when the child can comprehend
all that he is told (after the age of 11 or 12), But by then
the child is no longer a child and his mental structure is
becoming that of the adult.

PART I

REALISM

In estimating the child's conceptions of the world the
first question, obviously, is to decide whether external
reality is as external and objective for the child as it is
for us. In other words, can the child distinguish the self
from the external world ? In an earher study of child
logic ^ we also met at the outset the problem of the
self and reached the conclusion that logic develops as
thought becomes sociaUsed. So long as the child supposes
that every one necessarily thinks hke himself, he will not
spontaneously seek to convince others, nor to accept
common truths, nor, above all, to prove or test his
opinions. If his logic lacks exactitude and objectivity
it is because the social impulses of maturer years are
counteracted by an innate egocentricity. In studying
the child's thought, not in this case in relation to others
but to things, we are faced at the outset with the analog-
ous problem of the child's capacity to dissociate thought
from self in order to form an objective conception of
reality.

At first sight the question seems futile. The child, like
the uncultured adult, appears exclusively concerned with
things. He is indifferent to the Ufe of thought and the
originaUty of individual points of view escapes him. His
earhest interests, his first games, his drawings are all con-
cerned solely with the imitation of what is. In short, the
child's thought has every appearance of being exclusively
reahstic.

J. Piaget, Language and Thought of the Child. Kegan Paul, 1926.

83

34 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

But realism is of two tj^es, or rather, objectivity must
be distinguished from realism. Objectivity consists in so
fully realising the countless intrusions of the self in every-
day thought and the countless illusions which result —
illusions of sense, language, point of view, value, etc. —
that the preliminary step to every judgment is the effort
to exclude the intrusive self. Realism, on the contrary,
consists in ignoring the existence of self and thence
regarding one's own perspective as immediately objective
and absolute. ReaUsm is thus anthropocentric illusion,
finality — in short, all those illusions which teem in the
history of science. So long as thought has not become
conscious of self, it is a prey to perpetual confusions
between objective and subjective, between the real and the
ostensible ; it values the entire content of consciousness
on a single plane in which ostensible realities and the uncon-
scious interventions of the self are inextricably mixed.

It is thus not futile, but, on the contrary, indispensable
to establish clearly and before all else the boundary the
child draws between the self and the external world.
Nor is the method new. The work of Mach and Baldwin
has long since made it familiar to psychology. Mach
showed that the distinction between the internal or psychic
world and the external or physical world is far from
innate. It arises from action, which, engendered in a
reality, of itself undifferentiated, comes httle by little to
group images about one or other of these two poles,
round which two intercorresponding systems are built up.

Baldwin uses the term projective for that primitive
state in which images are simply " presented " to con-
sciousness, without there being any distinction between
the self and the not-self. This projective stage is char-
acterised by what he terms " adualisms " : the dualisms
between internal and external, and between thought and
things, in particular, being at this stage entirely absent
and only subsequently being gradually constructed by
logical development. 1

^ J. M. Baldwin, Thoughts and Things.

REALISM 35

But these views are still theoretical. Mach's hypothesis
is not based on a true genetic psychology and " the
genetic logic " of Baldwin is constructive rather than
experimental. Whence any attempt to pursue more
closely his ingenious developments reveals, if not their
precarious structure, at least their complexity.

What, for example, does " projection " really mean ?
The difficulty of distinguishing " projection " from " ejec-
tion " renders three interpretations possible. Sometimes
there is simply a failiu^e to differentiate between the self
and the external world, that is, absence of consciousness
of self. Thus it is claimed that when a child speaks of
himself in the third person, it is because he sees himself
not in the r61e of subject but as if from without. In this
case " projection " signifies that the child in question
recounts, and perhaps imagines, his own actions as belong-
ing to an external order of things.

In other cases, there is " projection " when we attribute
to things characteristics belonging to the self or to thought.
Thus the child who places the " name of the sun " in the
sun, " projects " an internal reahty into the external
world.

Finally, it is difficult to distinguish " projection " from
those cases in which we endow things not only with our
own characteristics but also with such conscious motives
as might occasion the sensation we experience in observing
them ; thus a child, frightened by the sight of fire, endows
the fire with maUcious designs. It is not the feeling of fear
which is attributed to the fire, rather the child projects
into the fire the reciprocal sentiment of mahciousness.

It is in this third sense that psycho-analysts have used
the word " projection." It is a different sense from the
two former but it is obvious that there is a relationship
between aU three and probably complete continuity. At
any rate in all three cases there is " aduahsm " between
the internal and the external.

What then is the mechanism of projection ? Does it
imply simply failure to classify the contents of conscious-

36 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

ness? This is the impression given by reading Baldwin. He
explains clearly enough the process by which the contents
are differentiated and the nature of the " dualisms " so
formed, but the construction of the primitive and aduaUstic
states is not made clear. This is due, no doubt, to Mr.
Baldwin's method. In his later writings his genetic logic
is built up with great analytic subtlety, but as if it was
dependent on psychological introspection alone, that is
to say as if he regarded consciousness as an ultimate datum
and took no account either of the unconscious or of the
biological factor. But it is questionable whether genetic
psychology must not necessarily suppose biological data,
and particularly whether " projection " does not result
from an unconscious process of assimilation, previously
conditioned by the objective world and the self, irrespec-
tive of consciousness. If such is the case, the various
types of projection are dependent on the various possible
combinations of assimilation and adaptation.

But to reveal these processes and to trace their evolu-
tion, a minute study of the facts is absolutely essential.
Since the field of study is obviously so vast, we shaU
limit ourselves to the analysis of such clearly defined
facts as will throw most light on these difficult questions.
We shall adopt a method of regression. Starting from a
description of the conceptions children form as to the
nature of thought (dualism between thought and things),
we shall thence pass to a study of the boundaries children
draw, in the matter of words, names and dreams, between
the external and internal worlds, concluding with a brief
analysis of certain kindred phenomena. The advantage
of this regressive method is that in starting with the
phenomena that are easiest to interpret we shall be able
to disentangle certain guiding threads which we should
miss in following a chronological method.

CHAPTER I
THE NOTION OF THOUGHT

Let us imagine a being, knowing nothing of the distinction
between mind and body. Such a being would be aware
of his desires and feeUngs but his notions of self would
undoubtedly be much less clear than ours. Compared
with us he would experience much less the sensation of
the thinking self within him, the feeling of a being in-
dependent of the external world. The knowledge that
we are thinking of things severs us in fact from the actual
things. But, above all, the psychological perceptions of
such a being would be entirely different from our own.
Dreams, for example, would appear to him as a disturb-
ance breaking in from without. Words would be bound
up with things and to speak would mean to act directly
on these things. Inversely, external things would be less
material and would be endowed with intentions and will.

We shall try to prove that such is the case with the child.
The child knows nothing of the nature of thought, even at
the stage when he is being influenced by adult talk concern-
ing " mind," " brain," " inteUigence."

The technique is briefly as follows. The child is asked :
" Do you know what it means to think of something ?
When you are here and you think of your house, or when
you think of the holidays, or of your mother, you are
thinking of something." And then when the child has
understood : " Well then, what is it you think with ? "
If, as seldom happens, he has not grasped the idea, the
matter must be further explained : " When you walk,
you walk with the feet ; well then, when you think, what

87

38 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

do you think with ? " Whatever the answer may be,
the meaning behind the words is what matters. Finally
comes the question, supposing it were possible to open a
person's head without his dying, could you see a thought,
or touch it, or feel it with the finger, etc. Naturally, these
last questions, which are suggestive, must be kept to the
end, that is to say till the moment when the child cannot
be made to say anything more of itself.

Moreover, when, as sometimes happens, the child makes
use of words he has learnt, such as " brain," " mind,"
etc., he must be questioned further on the words until
it is clear how he came to assimilate them. They
may be merely empty phrases, or, on the contrary,
they may be exceedingly suggestive deformations of true
conceptions.

In this way we have traced three distinct stages, the
first of which is easily distinguishable from the other two
and appears to contain a purely spontaneous element.
During this stage children believe that thinking is " with
the mouth." Thought is identified with the voice.
Nothing takes place either in the head or in the body.
Naturally, thought is confused with the things themselves,
in the sense that the word is a part of the thing. There
is nothing subjective in the act of thinking. The average
age for children of this stage is 6.

The second stage is marked by adult influences. The
child has learnt that we thmk with the head, sometimes
it even alludes to the " brain." Three circumstances,
however, indicate a certain degree of spontaneity in the
child's convictions. The first is the age : this type of
answer is always found about the age of 8, But more
important is the continuity existing between the first and
second stages. Indeed, thought is often looked on as a
voice inside the head, or in the neck, which shows the
persistence of the influence of the child's previous con-
victions. Finally, there is the way in which the child
materialises thought : thought is made of air, or of blood,
or it is a ball, etc.

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 39

The third stage, the average age of which is 11-12,
shows thought no longer materialised. It is no doubt
difficult to distinguish clearly the third stage from the
second. But the essential for us is to distinguish the
second from the first, that is to say the adult's contribu-
tion from the child's conviction.

§ I. The First Stage : Thought is with the Mouth.
— Stem's daughter,^ Hilda, thought that we speak with
the tongue and animals with the mouth. She further
admitted that people think when they talk and stop
thinking when their mouths are shut. According to the
material we have collected such convictions are very
general among children.

Mont. (7 ; o) 2 : " You know what it means to think ?
— Yes. — Then think of your house. What do you think
with ? — The mouth. — Can you think with the mouth
shut ? — No. — With the eyes shut ? — Yes. — With the ears
stopped up ? — Yes. — Now shut your mouth and think of
your house. Are you thinking ? — Yes. — What did you
think with ? — The mouth."

Pig (9 ; 6, backward) : " You know the word ' think ' ?
— Yes. — What does it mean, to think ? — When someone is
dead and you think of them. — Do you sometimes think ? —
Yes, of my brother. — Do you think at school ? — No. — And
here ? (we were in the school office). — Yes, I think because
you have asked me things. — What do you think with ? —
The mouth and ears. — And do babies think ? — No. — Does
a baby think when its mother talks to it ? — Yes. — What
with ? — With the mouth."

Acker (7:7): " What do you think with ? — The
mouth." This statement was reiterated four times in

^ Die Kinder spr ache, p. 210. Leipzig, 1907. See also Sully, Studies
of Childhood.

» 7 ; 0 = 7 years, o months. The words of the child are in italics and
those of the examiner in Roman lettering. All the words quoted are
exactly as they were spoken. Inverted commas mark the beginning
and end of a conversation in which no omission has been made. All
the subjects were boys unless otherwise stated.

[Translator's note.] French-speaking children generally have a
wider vocabulary than English children of the same age, and where on
account of an unnatural ring in the English equivalent, any modification
has been made, the French phrase is inserted in brackets.

40 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the course of an examination on dreams which appears
later. After the questions on animism we added : " Can
a dog think ? — Yes, it listens. — Can a bird think ? — No,
it hasn't any ears. — What does a dog think with ? — Its
ears. — Does a fish think ? — No. — A snail ? — No. — A horse ?
— Yes, with its ears. — A hen ? — Yes, with its mouth."

ScHMi (5^) : " What do people think with ? — The
mouth."

MuY (6) : " What do you think with ? — With something,
with my mouth."

Sometimes, as we have just seen, thinking is not only
with the mouth but with the ears.

Barb (5j) : " You know what it means to think ? —
When you can't remember something, you think. — What do
you think with ? — The ears. — If you were to stop them
up, could you think ? — Yes . . . no. . . ."

Rehm (5 ; ii) : " You know what it means to think of
something ? — Yes. — Think of your house. — Yes. — What
do you think with ? — With the ears. — When you think of
your house, you think with the ears ? — Yes."

Barb's formula is interesting : to think is to recall a
voice or a forgotten sound. The above cases lead directly
to the following. These foreshadow the second stage, for
the children already say we think with the head, but the
thought is not yet internal for it is still associated with
the mouth. We shall reserve for the second stage the
children who no longer speak of the mouth and who
regard thought as a little voice situated in the head.
Between the two groups there are innumerable transitions,
but in any attempt at classification a line must be drawn
somewhere. We shall, therefore, keep for the first stage
those children who expHcitly use the word " mouth."

Ceres (7) : " What do we think with ? — / don't know.
— Where do we think ? — In the head. — Where ? — In the
mouth, inside the head."

Ratt (8 ; 10) : " When you think of your house, where
is what you think ? — In the head. — What is there inside
your head ? — Nothing. — How can you think of your house
then ? — With the mouth." " Are there words inside your

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 41

head ? — No. — Is there a voice ? — Yes. — Are the voice and
thinking the same thing ? — Yes."

Kenn (7^) : " What do you think with ? — Inside my
head. — Is the head empty or full ? — Full. — If someone
opened your head, would they see when you were think-
ing ? — No, because they couldn't see. — If they could look
inside your head without your dying, would they see your
thought ? — You can't hear it when you speak gently. —
What do you think with ? — The head. — With what part
of the head ? — The mouth. — What is inside the head ? Is
thought inside ? — Yes, when you are thinking of something.
— What is inside the head ? — When you speak. — Can you
think when your mouth is shut ? — Yes, without speaking.
— What do you think with when you don't speak ? — The
mouth. — What is there inside the head when you think ?
— Nothing. — Can you see thought ? — No. — Could I hear it ?
— No. — Could I feel it if I put my finger there ? — Yes."

This is an excellent example. The resistance and the
spontaneity of the child's conviction are clearly seen ;
without any suggestion he starts saying that you can't
hear the thought when you speak gently and only then
realises that thinking is with the mouth. Thought is thus
a silent voice inside the head. Note, however, that you
can feel this voice with the finger : Kenn here forestalls
those cases in which thought is explicitly assimilated to
air (the breath expelled from the mouth in speaking).

In all the above children there is a spontaneous con-
viction at the root of the answers given. In others there
is at first nothing, but during the course of the examina-
tion a conviction is " Uberated " though it has not been
suggested by it, and here is the interesting point, this
conviction resembles the former spontaneous one.

Metr (5 ; 9) : " When you think, what do you think
with ? — / don't know. — With your hands ? — No. — With
your head ? — No. You can't ever see thinking. — What do
you read with ? — The eyes. — Can you think with your
eyes shut P—Y^s.— With your mouth shut ^—No, I can't.
— With your ears stopped up ? — Yes. — Do babies think ?
— No, they don't know how. They are too little. — What do
we think with ? — / don't know. I've never seen thinking. —

42 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Do we think with the head ?—iVo.— What then 7— With
the mouth."

Here is an excellent example of the liberated conviction.
The conviction can be seen gradually emerging, without
direct intervention from us, but also without the child
inunediately finding a solution.

Sometimes varieties are found, but they are rare. Only
one child (Go, 5 ; 9) said that thinking was with the heart.
But this must have been a word he had been taught, for
during the course of the questions. Go changed, and stated
that thinking was with the ears. With this exception,
all the subjects that could not be classified as belonging
either to the second or the third stage, stated thinking
to be either with the mouth or with the ears. The children
being either of a visual or an auditory type, it might
have been supposed that their answers would correspond
and that all the former would claim to think with the
eyes. But this was not found, and the question of imagery
seems to play no part. At any rate the only two children
who said they thought with the eyes, gave this answer
after being questioned on the subject of dreams, which
reduces the value of their statements.

How is this assimilation of thought to language to be
interpreted ? In the first place, it must be reahsed that
to children the word " thinking " has a restricted mean-
ing ; for them, to think means to reflect, that is, tb think
with an effort. They have no idea of any other mani-
festation of thought, excepting the dream of which we
shall speak later. The word " memory " is generally
unknown to them, and when asked with what they
" remember," they either fail to understand or they
again give the answer that it is with the mouth. But
if the term thought has a restricted sense for them, it is
none the less the only word which signifies to children a
purely mental act. And as we have just seen, they
regard the mouth as the only seat of this mental activity.
What follows ?

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 43

There is one essential distinction that must be intro-
duced here. Stem ^ claimed that from about the age of
3, a differentiation is made between the psychical and
the physical, in the sense that from this time the child
uses certain words meaning " to beUeve," " to appear,"
etc., as in the sentence, " I think (je crois) she has a head-
ache." 2 The child, he claims, thus distinguishes between
the real it perceives from the interpretation or hypothesis,
that is to say between things and thought. But we must
guard against the fallacy of accepting that which is only
implicitly expressed as being comprehended and for that
reason the sphere of action must not be confounded with
that of reflection. In the sphere of action, in the actual
flow of thought, it is certainly true that the children of
whom Stem speaks begin to distinguish immediate per-
ception from suppositions and inferences. This is a
notable advance, but it is not a reason for supposing that
such children are themselves conscious of the duality
(that is to say, have reaUsed what is implied in this
action). Above all, it is no reason for assuming that
they have deduced from this duality the idea of a reality
that is perceived and a thought that interprets it.

In short, there is no ground for supposing they have
made any general distinction between the psychical and
the physical. The only discovery which these children
have made is that they no longer regard reality as being
entirely in accordance with their wants and their asser-
tions (see Language and Thought, pp. 232, 233). But
physical reality at this stage may well be so fully endowed
with intentions and with psychical characteristics, etc.,
that the child can easily fail to recognise the thought as
his own or conceive it as a material voice.

In treating of the development of the notion of thought,
we may thus regard as primitive the child's conviction

^ Die Kinder spr ache. Leipzig, 1907

* The French child distinguishes between "'I think " (je pense) and
' I beheve " (je crois), where the Enghsh child will normally use
' I think " for both. [Translator's note.]

44 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

that it thinks with the mouth. The notion of thinking,
as soon as it appears, becomes confused with that of
voice, that is to say with words, either spoken or heard.

It would certainly be expected that since speech is an
activity of the self, some distinction between psychical
and physical would already be present at this stage. But
there are two fundamental objections to this view : firstly,
words are, for the child, a part of material reahty ; and
secondly, the subjective activity involved in speech is
either unnoticed by the child or is assimilated to a material
process, such as breathing or blowing. Thought thus
consists either of " word-things " or, more rarely, of air.

In fact, to children words convey nothing internal or
psychical. We shall try to prove this subsequently by a
direct analysis, when we shall find that words are regarded
as a part of things and are situated within the things.
The function of the ears and mouth is thus limited to
collaborating with the things, to receiving words and to
sending them forth. So, too, we shall see that at a certain
stage the dream is "in the room," in the same way that
thought is both outside and inside the mouth. There is
no clear distinction between the psychical and internal
and the material and external.

For the moment then we must accept a first approxi-
mation. When children are questioned " where does
thought come from ? " whilst stating that they think
with the mouth they will still not hesitate to give an
external origin to thought. This is sliown in the two
following examples : —

Acker (7 ; 7) told us four times, as we have already
seen, that thinking is with the mouth. " When you think
with the mouth, where does the thought come from ? —
From the eyes, from outside. You see, then you think. —
Then when you don't speak, are you thinking ? — Yes.
— What with ? — The mouth." — A moment later : " When
you don't say anything what do you think with ? — The
stomach." As he said this Acker pointed to the larynx in
explanation, showing that he was thinking all the time
of voice.

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 45

Ratt (8 ; 10) told us, as we saw, that there is nothing
in the head, when we think. " Can one see the voice ? —
No. — Can one feel it ? — Yes. — Have words got strength ?
— Yes. — Tell me a word which has strength ? — The wind.
— Why has the word ' wind ' got strength ? — Because it
goes quickly. — Is it the word or the wind which goes
quickly ? — The wind. — Tell me a word which has strength.
— When you give something a kick. — Is that a word ? —
No. — Tell me a word which has strength — . . . — What
do you think with ? — With the mouth. — What is inside
the head when you think ? — Nothing. — What does the
voice do ? — It speaks. — You know what words are ? —
When you speak. — Where is the word ' house ' ? — In the
mouth. — Is it in the head ? — No."

The value of these examples will perhaps be questioned
before our results as to words have been seen (§ 4 and
Chapter II). But in the Ught of these results, the two
cases above are quite clear. Neither of the children dis-
tinguished words from the things named. Acker thus
beheved that to see a house was enough to make one
instantly think of the word, as if the name was inscribed
on the thing. Ratt was unable to understand that it is
things and not words that have strength. The word is
thus perceived in the thing. Just as to the sensationalists
thought was a series of images imprinted on the brain by
the stimulus of things, so to the child it is the uttering of
words which are placed in the mouth by the agency of the
same stimulus.

Here is the case of a child who has his own conception
of memory, characteristic of the realism of which we are
speaking.

ScHi (6) gave the word " memory " spontaneously.
" What is memory ? — When you remember something. —
How do you remember ? — It suddenly comes into the mind
[revient dans notre dme). When you've been told something
it comes into your mind, then it goes out and then it comes
hack. — It goes out ? Where does it go to ? — Into the sky.
— Do you really beheve that ? — Yes, I don't know, but it's
what I think [ce que je crois)."

The flight of the memory to the sky is undoubtedly

46 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

made up. But to "go out " and to " come back " are
significant expressions. They must be interpreted literaUy,
for, as we shall see later, Schi also describes dreams as
" coming out " when he is asleep (see Chapter III, § 3 :
" When you are not asleep it is inside the head. When you
are asleep it comes out " . . . "it goes against the wall ").
Schi must be credited with no exact idea as to the " how "
of these phenomena, his words simply mean that he has
not yet come to regard memories, words heard, or dreams
as " internal." In deaUng with names we shall come on
similar examples of children stating that the name is
" in the room " (see the case of Roc, Chapter II, § 2).

In short, in so far as thought is assimilated to voice it
becomes actually a part of the objects thought of. To
convince the reader of the truth of this conclusion we
must simply refer him to the results of Chapter II. As
to the internal aspect of thought which for the child
consists essentially in the articulation of words, we shall
now try to show that this also is material, and, what is
especially curious, that it also is regarded as actually a
part of the external world.

As a matter of fact, the majority of children are not
aware of this internal activity. To think is to speak and
speaking just happens, but some children do note the
existence of the voice and then, during the first stage,
they assimilate this voice to " the air," the air being both
internal and external, manifest both in breathing and in
the atmosphere.

Ron (7^) : " Can one see thought ? — Yes. — How ? —
In front of you. — WTiere ? There (50 cms away) or right
over there ? — It doesn't make any difference. The wind
makes the grass move and you see it moving. That is thinking.
— Is it in front of you or in the brain ? — Both, you can
think anyhow. — Can one touch thought ? — Sometimes,
when the thoughts are real."

Brunn (11 ; II, backward and slow) : " Has thought
any strength ? — No, because it is not alive. — Why is it not
alive ? — It is air. — Where is the thought ? — In the air,
outside." But Brunn also states that the thought is in

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 47

ourselves ; memory, according to him, "is a thought. —
Where is it ? — In the head."

Ris (8| ; a girl) , whom we shall again meet with in
connection with dreams (Chapter HI, § i) stated, without
having been previously questioned about thought, that
the dream is " in words. — And what are the words in ?
— The voice — Where does the voice come from ? — The
air."

We shall find similar cases in the second stage (§ 3).

In connection with dreams we shall also frequently
find thought assimilated to the air, or the wind, or even
" la fumee qui sort du ventre " (breathing). How are
these facts to be interpreted ? At first sight one might
attribute them to adult influence ; these children have
been told of a soul or a mind which is invisible like the air,
and they have concluded that thinking is by means of
the air. We shall find cases in the second stage which
must probably be so regarded. But the above cases seem
to resist this interpretation, for these children will not
admit that thought is internal ; it is outside as well as
inside. Ron, an intelligent child, is particularly clear
on this ; he confuses the thinking with the thing thought
of. This is what makes him say that when you think of
" things which are real " you can touch the thought.
Moreover, a systematic adult influence cannot account
for the many varieties of answer all relating to voice or
breathing (the air, the wind, " la fumee du ventre," etc.).

In short, thought when it consists of words is a part
of the things named, and when it consists of voice it is
assimilated to air, which is both internal and external.
Thus in neither case is there a clear boundary between
the self and the external world.

§ 2. Looking and Seeing. — Before proceeding further
with the notion of thought, it may be useful to consider
briefly what seems to be a confirmation of the above
interpretations. Does the same confusion between internal
and external exist in children's conceptions of vision ?
The subject has not yet been investigated, but in the

48 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

course of this research we have come by chance on certain
facts worth mentioning here, because in themselves very
significant. First comes a question quoted by Stanley
Hall,^ coupled with an adult recollection of childhood.

From a boy of 5 years old : " Papa, why don't out looks
mix when they meet."

From one of our collaborators : " When I was a little
girl I used to wonder how it was that when two looks met
they did not somewhere hit one another. I used to imagine
the point to he half-way between the two people. I used also
to wonder why it was one did not feel someone else's look,
on the cheek for instance if they were looking at one's cheek."

Next are three entirely spontaneous cases of confusion
between vision and light, which were observed in answer
to questions concerning the subject either of shadows or of
dreams : —

Pat (10) stated that a box makes a shadow " because
the clouds (Pat beheves it to be the clouds which give hght
when there is no sun) can't pass through it " {i.e. because
the light cannot pass through the box).

But immediately after Pat said of a portfolio that it
made a shadow " because the clouds can't see that side. —
Are to see and to give light the same thing ? — Yes. — Tell
me the things which give light ? — The sun, the moon, the
stars, the clouds and God. — Can you give hght ? — No . . .
Yes. — How ? — With the eyes. — Why ? — Because if you
hadn't eyes you wouldn't see properly."

Due (6^) also stated that the light cannot see through
a hand, alike confusing " seeing " with " giving Hght."

Sci (6) said that dreams come " with the light." — " How ?
— You are in the street. The lights (street-lamps) can see
there . . . they see on the ground." " Tell me some things
that give Ught. — Lights, candles, matches, thunder, fire,
cigarettes. — Do eyes give Ught or not ? — Yes, they give
light. — Do they give hght at night ? — No ? — Why not ?
Because they are shut. — When they are open do they give
light ? — Yes. — Do they give hght Hke lamps ? — Yes, a
little bit."

These last cases are interesting from their analogy with
the theory of perception of Empedocles, who, as is well

1 Stanley Hall, Pedagogical Seminary, Vol. X (1903), P- 346.

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 49

known, explained vision as due to the light given out by
an object meeting the Ught that emanates from the eye.^

The five cases point to the same conclusion : seeing is
for these children partly outside the eye. It comes from
the eye, it gives Ught and they are puzzled why they
don't feel it. We do not know whether these bejiefs are
general or not, but independently they point to the
possibility of a thought which is at the same time both
internal and external and thus confirm the interpretation
given in the previous section.

§ 3. The Second and Third Stages : Thinking is
WITH THE Head. — The convictions of the first stage may
be regarded as spontaneous since they are general and,
in so far as this is so, cannot be due to adult suggestion.
The convictions which characterise the second stage seem,
on the other hand, to have been in part assimilated. It
is hard to see how children quite alone could have dis-
covered thinking to be with the head. However, it is
interesting to note that only after the age of 7 or 8 (in
a few cases 6) does the child ask questions of his own
accord and assimilate what he is told.

The characteristic of the second stage as opposed to
the third is that thought, although situated in the head,
remains material. Either the child continues simply to
believe that it is voice or breath (first type) or it attempts
to understand the words " brain," " intelligence," etc.,
and imagines balls, tubes, winds, etc. (second type).

The following cases of the first type are of special interest
in showing the persistence of phenomena of the first stage,
despite progressive pressure from the adult.

Falq (7:3): " You know what it means to think ? —
You think of things you want to do. — What do you think
with ? — With something. — What with ? — A little voice. —
Where is it ? — There (he points to the forehead)." '.' Where
does the httle voice come from ? — The head. — How does it
happen. — By itself. — Does a horse think ? — Yes. — What

^ See Arn. Raymond, Histoxre des Sciences exactes et naturelles dans
I'antiquiti greco-romaine, p. 43. Blaiichard, 1924.

50 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

with ? — A little voice in the head. — And dogs ? — Yes. —
Does the little voice say words ? — Yes. — Why ? Dogs
can't talk. — They talk, then they listen. — Where ? — There
(pointing to the forehead). — Why ? — There is something
there. — What ? — A little hall." In the head is also " a
little mouth. — Is it there now ? — Yes. — You really believe
that ? — Yes." — A few moments later Falq speaks of
memory. " Where is it ? — Inside there (showing his fore-
head).— What is there ? — A little ball. — What is inside
it ? — Thoughts. — What would one see inside if one looked ?
Smoke. — Where does it come from ? — From the head."
" Where does the smoke come from ? — From the thoughts.
— Is thought smoke ? — Yes." " Why is thought inside the
ball ? — It is a little air and smoke that has come. — Where
from ? — From outside. — Where ? — The air outside and the
smoke from the chimney. — Is the air ahve ? — No, it is
because it is the air, and when you think of something it
comes into the ball. When you've thought of something the
thought comes with the air and the smoke." " How? — The
thought makes the air and the smoke come in and they mix."
" What is the smoke ? — Breath. — And the air ? — The
same." " Is there breath in you ? — No . . . yes, when we
breathe. — When you breathe what comes in and goes
out ? — Wind. — Does breathing make air ? — Yes. — And
smoke ? — No . . . yes, steam."

This case resembles those of Ron, Ris and Brunn (§ i) ;
particularly in the details concerning " the httle ball,"
etc. Falq shows exceedingly clearly how the air, smoke,
breathing and voice are all regarded as of the same nature
and interchangeable. Thus his spontaneous convictions
continue directly in the line of the first stage, but in
addition he has acquired certain notions, such as the
ball in his forehead. The " httle mouth " inside the head
recalls the child mentioned by Mile Malan who said, " it
is the mouth behind there (inside the head) which talks
to my mouth in front."

Reyb (8 ; 7) : " What is thought ? — When you think of
something. — What does that mean ? — You want to have it.
— What do we think with ? — Our brains. — Who told you
that ? — No one. . . . — Where did you learn the word ? —
I've ahoays known it. — What is the brain ? — The tubes in
the head. — What happens in these tubes ? — Something. —

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 51

What ? — What you think. — Can one see thought ? — No. —
And touch it ? — No. — What is it hke ? — What you hear.
— Can you think with the ears stopped up ? — No. — With
the eyes shut ? — No. — With the mouth shut ? — No. —
Where do the tubes go and where do they start ? — From
the ears. — And where do they go ? — To the mouth. — Who
told you about the tubes in the head ? — No one. — Have
you heard people speak of them ? — No."

The adult influence is clearly marked. But there seems
to be a spontaneous reaction when Reyb says that thought
is " what you hear."

Grand (8) stated when questioned on animism that the
moon doesn't know anything because " it hasn't any ears."
This gives an indication. Later : " You know what it
is to think ? — Yes. — What do you think with ? — The
head. — What is thought ? — It's white inside the head. —
What do you think with ? — A little voice."

Menn (12) also supposes one thinks " with the head. —
Could one see thought, if one opened the head ? — No, it
doesn't stay inside. — Could I see it ? — No. — Could I touch
it ? — No, it is what talks. — Could one feel it ? — No. — Why
not ? What is thought ? — Yes (you could feel it). It's
our voice."

The last case is striking, showing how the child, although
placing thought in the head, has not yet solved the ques-
tion of internal and external ; thought is " our voice,"
and the voice " doesn't stay inside."

Similar cases were found in other districts of Switzer-
land where Mile Perret continued the same research.

Nic (10 ; 3, a girl) supposes one could not see thought
because, " / should have to speak to it."

E. KuN (7 ; 4) and his sister M. Kun (8 ; 4) were
questioned one after the other without being given time
to compare. Both stated that thought is in the head and
that it is " white " and " round." M. Kun said it was " as
big as a large apple " ; E. Kun that it was " little." This
would seem to suggest traces of adult teaching on the
brain. However, E. Kun at other times maintained that
one thinks " with the mouth. — Where is the thought ? —
In the middle of the mouth. — Can one see it ? — Yes. —
Touch it ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it is too far away.

52 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

— Where ? — In the neck." The combination of spontane-
ous convictions with instruction received is evident.

In short, the value of these answers is proved by the
continuity they all show between the first and second
stages. At first we had the impression that the " voice "
was a recollection of religious teaching (" the voice of
conscience," etc.), but we gave up this interpretation in
face of the generahty of the cases.

None of the above children conceive thought as distinct
from matter. This materialism is also characteristic of the
following children, who under the pressure of adult concep-
tions no longer identify thought with voice, and we shall
see what strange deformations these conceptions undergo.
In a certain sense these deformations are quite as interest-
ing as the spontaneous reactions of the former children.

Im (6) : Thought is " my intelligence." It is " what makes
us think and try and find out. — Who told you that ? — /
wasn't told, hut I know." This " intelligence " cannot be
touched " because it is full of blood."

Duss (9) identified thought with the " brain," which
is as big " as a marble." Duss thought, however, that we
dreamed " with the mouth."

ZiMM (8 ; i) thinks with his " intelligence," but supposes
that if the head was opened one could see and touch this
intelligence.

Kauf (8 ; 8, a girl) thinks with her memory. " Memory
is something in the head which makes us think. — What do
you think this memory is hke. — It is a little square of skin,
rather oval, and inside there are stories {les histoires). —
What are they like ? — They are written on the flesh. —
What with ? — Pencil. — Who wrote them ? — God, before I
was horn, he put them there."

Evidently Kauf has made up the details. The tendency
to believe " stories " to be innate may be regarded, how-
ever, as spontaneous. This belief rests on the fact we
have frequently observed that children have a complete
amnesia as to the origins of their knowledge, however
recent. For example, Im, as we have just seen, is con-
vinced of having always known of " inteUigence." Reyb

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 53

has always known he had a brain, etc. (see on this subject
Judgment and Reason, Chapter IV, §1). It is, therefore,
quite natural that when children come to consider the origin
of their knowledge, they believe, like Kauf , that it is innate.
We shall find the same thing with the origin of names. It
has been suggested that this tendency of children to consider
all they have been taught as originating in themselves had
probably some influence on the psychical genesis of the
Platonic doctrine of memory and similar theories.

The following are cases of children who identify thought
with the air, but evidently as the result of a more or less
direct adult influence.

Tann (8) thinks with his "mind." "What is the
mind ? — It is someone who isn't like we are, who hasn't
skin and hasn't hones, and who is like air which we can't
see. After we're dead it goes away from our body. — Goes
away ? — It goes away hut it stays, when it goes away it still
stays. — What stays ? — It stays, but all the same it's in
Heaven." Tann has not yet accepted as irresistible the
dualism between internal and external. . . .

Peret (ii ; 7) : We think " with the forehead. — What is
inside it ? — Our mind." " Can one touch the mind ? —
No. — Why not ? — You can't touch it. You can't because
you can't see it. — Why not ? — It's air. — Why do you think
it is air ? — Because you can't touch it."

The difference is evident between these children and
those at the end of § i (Ron, Brunn, and Ris, and also
Falq § 3) who also confused thought with air, but whose
reflections were original and showed no trace of words
which they had learnt, whilst Tann and Peret, on the
contrary, distort conceptions acquired from their environ-
ment. These distortions are, however, always interesting
since they show to what extent thought still remains
material for children in the second stage.

It cannot, therefore, be asserted that in the second stage
thought has yet been distinguished from things. For
the child either simply prolongs the first stage by identify-
ing thought and voice or else he is more or less befogged
by the mere words to which he clings persistently. In

54 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

neither case is thought differentiated from the things
thought of, nor are words from the things named. There
is simply conflict between the child's earlier convictions
and the pressure of adult teaching, and this crisis is the
only mark of progress in the second stage which other-
wise brings the child no new solution.

When is the point at which the child definitely dis-
tinguishes thought from things, that is to say the point
which marks the beginning of the " third stage " ? The
technique we have followed so far cannot alone reveal so
subtle a distinction. But used in conjunction with an
examination on names and on dreams it provides very
useful information. We therefore propose to use simul-
taneously three tests as a means of revealing whether the
third stage has yet been reached.

Before concluding that a child distinguishes thought
from things it must be proved, (i) that the child is able
to situate thought in the head and to declare it invisible,
intangible, etc., in short, immaterial and distinct from
the " air " and " voice " ; (2) that the child is able to
distinguish words and names from the things themselves ;
(3) that the child is able to situate dreams in the head
and to realise that if one opened the head the dreams
could not be seen. (For points 2 and 3 see the technique
outlined later). No one of these tests is alone sufficient,
but their simultaneous use we consider adequate to prove
the arrival of the third stage.

The following example bears on points i and 3 : —

Vise (11 ; i) : " Where is thought ? — In the head. — If
someone opened your head, would he see your thought ?
— No. — Could he touch it ? — No. — Feel it as if it was air ?
— No . . . etc." Then : " What is a dream ? — It's a
thought. — What do you dream with ? — With the head. —
Are the eyes open or shut ? — Shut. — Where is the dream
whilst you are dreaming ? — In the head. — Not in front of
you ? — It's as if {/) you could see it. — Is there anything in
front of you when you dream ? — No, nothing. — What is
inside the head ? — Thoughts. — Is it the eyes which see
something inside the head ? — No."

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 55

The beginnings of the third stage may be placed approxi-
mately at the age of 11, though some cases are found at
10, and even at 9. But on the average the essential dis-
coveries that thought is not matter and that it is distinct
from the phenomena it deals with, are not made before
the age of 11.

§ 4. Words and Things. — The first two stages we have
just studied are characterised by two confusions, quite
distinct from each other though mutually contributory.
First, there is the confusion between thought and body ;
thought for the child, is an activity of the organism — the
voice — it is thus a thing among things and its essential
characteristic is material action, either on things or on
persons in whom it is interested. Secondly, there is con-
fusion between the sign and the thing signified, the
thought and the thing thought of. From this point of
view the child cannot distinguish a real house, for example,
from the concept or mental image or name of the house.
This point remains to be studied.

In what way does this all-important differentiation
reveal itself ? Which does the child first conceive as
belonging to the thinking subject : the concept, the
image or the word ? Certainly not the concept, and we
cannot say at what age the notion of " idea " appears.
It would make an interesting research to determine at
what point such expressions as " a wrong idea," " to have
an idea," etc., arise. From the preceding material all
we may say is that thing and concept are still confused
at the age of 7 by Ron (§ i), who maintains that we may
" touch thought " when it is of " things that are real."
It may, indeed, be observed that such a behef involves
'' things that are not real," that is to say mental objects —
what children name " stories " or things " said for fun."
But the study of children's explanations on the subject
of dreams shows that these mental objects are not regarded
as images but as things, as made of air, or words, etc.
The study of dreams will also furnish material as to
when the child conceives the existence of mental

56 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

images and the question can, therefore, be better studied
later.

Concerning words, the theories of Sully, Compayre, and
many others are well kno\yn, according to which it is
maintained with much justice that to a child's eye every
object seems to possess a necessary and absolute name,
that is to say, one which is a part of the object's very
nature. M. Luquet has shown that many children's
drawings bear a title simply because of this pecuUarity :
" The addition of a title has we consider no other meaning
than that of expressing the name of the object, which is
regarded by the designer as a property as inherent in its
essence and as worthy of being reproduced as its visual
characteristics." '

It will, therefore, be interesting to see at what age
children can distinguish the word which designates it
from the thing itself. To solve this problem we used two
different techniques. The most important will be dis-
cussed in the course of the next chapter, it deals with the
origin and place of the names of things. The more direct,
with which we shall deal now, is also the more question-
able. It consists simply in asking a child if words " have
strength," and if he falls into the trap to make him see
his own fallacy. The disadvantage lies in the fact that
there is a trap, and, if used alone, we should not have
dared to draw any conclusions from this method. But
it becomes interesting when combined with the methods
of Chapter II. Three types of answer, corresponding to
three successive stages, were found. In the first stage
(up to the age of 7-8), the children made no distinctions
between the word and the thing, and failed to understand
the problem. In the second stage (7-1 1) the children
understood the problem, but were unable to solve it
systematically. During the third stage (after 10 or 11)
the correct solution is given.

The following examples illustrate the first stage : —

^ Journal de Psychologic, 1922, p. 207.

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 57

BouRG (6) : " Can a word have strength ? — No . . .
yes. — Tell me a word which has strength. — Daddy, because
he's a daddy and he's strong. — When 1 say ' cloud,' is the
word ' cloud ' strong ? — Yes, because it gives light at night
(the idea that clouds give light when there is no sun
appears to be fairly general). — The word ' umbrella ' only
the word, not the ' umbrella ' itself, is that strong ? — A
bit, because someone might poke it in your eyes and that
would kill you."

Bow (6 ; 5) : " When I say ' umbrella ' I'm saying a
word, or 'drawer' that's another word, there isn't really
a drawer, they are just words. If I didn't say words to
you, you wouldn't know what I wanted to say. Say a
word. ..."

" The word ' sun * is it strong ? — No, because it doesn't
weigh much (the sun). — Is the word ' hit ' strong ? — No,
fairly strong. — Why ? — Because sometimes it hurts. — Is it
the word ' hit ' which is strong ? When I say the word
' hit ' with the mouth, only the word, is it strong ? — No,
because the mouth can't shout it. — Tell me a word which is
strong. — When a horse runs away."

Cam (6) : " If I say the word ' run,' I don't run. I say
the word with the mouth. Is a word strong ? — Yes. —
Why ? — Because you say it. — If I say the word ' jump ' is it
strong ? — Yes, because children jump with a skipping-rope."

The examples of the first stage obviously prove nothing
by themselves. It may be that these children realise
what a word is, but have no means of expressing the idea,
for the word " word " implies for them the presence of
the thing itself, in which case the experiment is of no
value. It may also be that we were unable to make our-
selves understood. In fact, the only means of proving
that these children really confuse the word and the thing
named is to show that older children manage to under-
stand the problem, though without being able to solve it.
This is proved by the examples of the second stage.

The second stage is, therefore, paradoxical. On one
hand, the child understands the problem and so dis-
tinguishes the word from the thing named ; but, on the
other, the distinction is not clear enough to save the
child from the trap, into which he continually falls.

58 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD
The following illustrate this stage : —

Krug (6) : " Is a word strong ? — No, it can't do any-
thing at all. — Are any words strong ? — Some words are
strong. — Which ? — The word ' strong ' because you are say-
ing it's strong. — Is the word ' elephant ' strong ? — Yes,
because an elephant can carry people. — An elephant can,
but simply the word ? — No, it isn't strong. — Why not ? —
Because it doesn't do anything. — What ? — The word. — Is
the word ' sleep ' strong ? — It is weak, because when you
sleep, you're tired. — Is the word ' run ' strong ? — Yes, if
the person's strong . . . it is strong the word ' run.' "

AuD (8 ; 8) : " Are words strong ? — No, words are
nothing at all. They aren't strong, you can't put anything
on them. — Tell me a word. — ' Curtains.' It isn't strong,
because if you put anything on it, it tears. A word isn't
strong because you can't build up anything on top of it. —
The word is when you speak. If you put anything on
'paper' (the word) it would break. — Are there any words
that are strong ? — No. — Tell me another word. — ' Um-
brella-stand.' It is strong because you can put umbrellas
in it. (Like ' curtains,' Aud chose this word because he
could see it in the room.) — Is it in the word you put
umbrellas ? — No. — Is the word strong ? — No. — And why
isn't the word ' curtains ' strong ? — Because it tears so
easily. — Is it the word which tears ? — (laughing) No, the
curtains. — Is the word ' motor ' strong ? — The word isn't
strong but the motor is (!) — Good, you've got it. Tell me
another word that isn't strong ? — A cobweb because you'd
have to put ever such light things not to break it. — Would the
word break ? — No (laughing). — Scatter-brains, caught
again ! — (laughing) Yes. — Tell me a word which isn't
strong. — Trees. — Is that a word that isn't strong ? — Yes,
because you couldn't put anything on it.— On what ? — On
the trees."

These cases are particulary striking since Krug and
still more Aud fully realise the problem. Aud, for instance,
says at the beginning that a word is " when you speak.''
He adds, however, spontaneously that the word " paper "
is not strong, because paper tears. Clearly in such a case
the confusion is more than verbal, and pertains to the
systematic difficulty of distinguishing the sign from the
thing signified, or thought from the thing thought of.

THE NOTION OF THOUGHT 59

The following is an example of the third stage, where a
child gradually comes to realise the catch in the question,
passing from the second to the following stage before our
eyes. The answers it will be seen are entirely spontaneous,
and it was they which led us to undertake this rapid
survey. The child himself spoke of " thought " as of
something immaterial and so suggested the idea of asking
by way of control if thought had strength. The child's
clear and entirely original reaction then gave the idea of
setting the same question with regard to words and testing
other younger children.

Tie (10 ; 10) : " Has thought got strength ? — No, it has
and then it hasn't. — Why hasn't it ? — It depends on what
you are thinking of. — When has it strength ? — When you
think of something strong. — If you think of this table, has
it ? — Yes. — If you think of the lake, has it ? — No. — If you
think of the wind, has it ? — Yes." (Tie had said a fdw
minutes before that the water of the lake had no strength
" because it was still," that the wind has strength,
" because it can blow down houses," and that the table
had, " because things can stand on it.") " Have words
got strength ? — // depends on the word. — Which ones have
strength ? — The word ' boxing ' . . . oh, no they haven't
any strength (laughing). — Why did you think they had
first ? — / was wrong. I was thinking it was the word that
hit."

This example is suggestive in itself. Tie's confusion
between the word and the thing is, in fact, accompanied
by an explicit and entirely spontaneous confusion between
the thought and the objects thought of. The fact that
Tie rid himself of the fallacy whilst being questioned only
adds further value to the case, since it shows the difficulty
which so keen and thoughtful a boy found in answering
correctly.

It is unnecessary to continue the inquiry, for the
systematic study of " nominal reaUsm " to be undertaken
in the next chapter will supply the further information
lacking. These cases of which the most characteristic
have been quoted, may in the meanwhile be taken to

6o CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

prove that up to the age of lo-ii there is confusion
between the sign and the thing signified, and as we saw
earher, it is at about the age of ii that the idea of thought
is dissociated from the idea of physical substance. We
thus see that it is between lo and ii that the child becomes
aware of thoughts or of words as distinct from the things
of which he thinks. The two discoveries contribute to
one another.

In conclusion, until about ii, to think is to speak —
either with the mouth or with a little voice situated in
the head — and speaking consists in acting on things
themselves by means of words, the words sharing the
nature of the things named as well as of the voice pro-
ducing them.

All this involves as yet only matter and material action
and the resulting realism is due to a perpetual confusion
between subject and object, between internal and external.

CHAPTER II

NOMINAL REALISM

The problem of names involves the same difficulties which
came to light in studying the dualism that exists in the
child's mind between internal and external. Are names
in the subject or the object ? Are they signs or things ?
Have they been discovered by observation or chosen
without any objective reason ? The child's answers to
these questions will reveal the extent and the exact
significance of the reaUsm which was foreshadowed in
the previous chapter.

The problem of names probes to the very heart of the
problem of thought, for to the child, to think means to
speak. And if " word " is a somewhat vague concept to
the younger children (at any rate before the age of 7 or 8
that is, during the first stage as distinguished in section 4)
what is meant by a " name " is on the contrary quite clear
All the children tested knew the meaning of a " name "
it was "to call something by" (pour appeler). It is
therefore, perfectly natural to ask how names began
where they are, why they are, what they are, etc. Also
in certain cases it may be possible to add to the results
thus obtained from conversation with children, confir-
matory proof drawn from a study of their spontaneous
questions. Indeed, every one must be familiar with the
questions on names which characterise the most primitive
stages of a child's questioning : What is that ? And a
careful examination of these questions shows that in learn-
ing the names of things the child at this stage beheves
it is doing much more. It thinks it is reaching to the

61

62 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

essence of the thing and discovering a real explanation.
As soon as it knows the name, the problem no longer
exists. Later, questions bearing on etymology also furnish
useful material and show the same tendency towards a
nominal realism.

The following examples of two spontaneous remarks
show this interest in names and especially the quasi-
magical aspect sometimes taken by nominal realism.

Ar (6 1) remarked during a building game : "And when
there weren't any names. ..."

Bo (6^) replied : " // there weren't any words it would he
very awkward [on serait tres ennuye). You couldn't make
anything. How could things have been made " (if there
hadn't been names for them) ? The name thus seems to
be a part of the essence of the thing and is even a
necessary condition of its being made.

In short, there is nothing artificial about this subject,
it is on the contrary a natural centre of interest to children.
The only difficulty is to find the right method of setting
questions. The criterion will be as usual only to ask
questions to which older children can give a correct
solution and to which the youngest will give answers that
improve progressively with age.

The technique on which we decided after much experi-
menting is briefly as follows. Eight types of question are
asked in the following order : (i) Having made sure that
the child knows what a name is, he is asked to give his
own name and then " the name of that," " and of that "
(as various objects are pointed to). " Very well then,
what is a name ? " ; (2) he is next asked, " How did names
begin ? How did the name of the sun begin ? " ; (3) the
answer having been given he is then asked : " Well, but
how did we know that that was what the sun was called ? "
(4) " Where are names ? Where is the sun's name ?
Where is the name of the lake ? " etc. ; (5) " Do things
know their names ? Does the sun know its name ? Do
the clouds know they are called clouds or not ? " etc. ; (6)
" Has the sun always had its name or was it first without

NOMINAL REALISM 63

a name and did it only get its name afterwards ? " ; (7)
" Why is the sun called ' sun ' ? Why have the Jura and
the Sal^ve got those names " etc. ; and finally (8) " You
are called Henry, your brother is Paul. — You might have
been called Paul and he Henry, mightn't you ? — Well
could the Jura have been called ' Sal^ve ' in the beginning
and the Saleve ' Jura ? ' — And could the sun have been
called 'moon ' and the moon ' sun ' ? "

These questions will perhaps seem too subtle. But as
all were correctly solved at the age of about 11 or 12 we
are justified in questioning why they are solved no earlier.

§ I. The Origin of Names. — In this section we shall
deal with questions i, 2, 6 and 3. The first question, that
of defining a name, is solved from the earliest age. Question
2 gives rise to 3 groups of answers corresponding to three
stages. During the first stage (5 to 6) children regard
names as belonging to things and emanating from them.
During the second stage (7, 8) names were invented by
the makers of the things — God or the first men. In the
case of the first men, the child generally supposes that the
men who gave the names are those who made the things :
the sun, the clouds, etc. (according to the artificialist
connections to be studied in Part III). During the third
stage, which appears about the age of 9 or 10 the child
regards names as due to men of no particular identity,
whilst the name is no longer identified with the idea of
creation.

The following are answers to question 2, illustrating
the first stage where the name emanates directly from the
thing.

Lav (6^) says that names are " to call things by " —
" How did name begin ? How did the sun get its name ?
— / don't know. — Where did your name ' Jules ' come from ?
Who gave it you ? — / don't know. — Your father ? — Yes.
— And where did the name of the sun come from ? — The
sky. — Is it the sun or the name of the sun which comes
from the sky ? — The sun. — And where does its name come
from ? — The sky. — Did someone give the sun its name or
did it get it by itself ? — Some one gave it. — Who ? — The

64 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

sky." " Where did the Arve get its name ? — From the
mountain. — Tell me, did people give it its name ? — No,
etc."

Pert (7) concerning the name of the Saleve : " How-
did it get its name in the beginning ? — From a letter. — And
where did the letter come from ? — The name. — And the
name ? — From the mountain. — How did the name come
from the mountain ? — By a letter. — Where did the letter
come from ? — The mountain. — Clouds are called clouds,
aren't they ? Where does the name of the clouds come
from ? — The name ? That is the name. — Yes, but where
does it come from ? — The clouds. — What do you mean when
you say it comes from the clouds ? — It's the name they've
got. — But how did the name happen ? How did it begin ?
— By itself. — Yes, but where did the name come from ? —
By itself."

These children evidently distinguish the name from
the thing named, but can only conceive the name as
coming from the thing itself. The following case is inter-
mediate between this stage and the next : —

Stei (5|) : " Have you a name ? — Yes, Andre. — And
that ? — A box. — And that ? — A pen, etc. — What are
names for ? — They are what you can see when you look at
things (Stei thus believes that one has only to look at a
thing to ' see ' its name) — Why have you got a name ? —
So as to know what Fm called. — Then what are names for ? —
To knoiv what things are called. — How did the sun get its
name in the beginning ? — / don't know. — What do you
think ? — Because the sun made the name, the sun gave it in
the beginning and so the sun is called sun. — And how did
you get your name ? — We have to be christened. — Who
christened you ? — The clergyman. — And did you take
your name ? — The clergyman makes it for us. — How did
the moon get its name ? — The moon ? The moon is called
the moon. — How did it start being called moon ? — God
called it that in the beginning. — How did the clouds start
being called clouds ? — God started them by making them. —
But are the clouds' names the same thing as the clouds ? —
Yes, the same thing. — How did the Saleve first get its
name ?-^By itself. — Did the Saleve give itself its name or
did someone give it its name ? — // was always called Saleve."
Stei thus comes back to the idea that the name emanates
from the thing.

During the second stage, this belief suggested in passing

NOMINAL REALISM 65

by Stei, becomes more and more pronounced ; the name
comes from the person who made the thing and is thus
from the beginning intimately connected with the thing
itself. The following examples illustrate this : —

Fran (9) : " You know what a name is ? — It's to know
what the children are called. — Where do names come from ?
How did they begin ? — Because God said, ' Now it's time
to make children and then they must be called by names.' —
What does that mean to ' be called by names ' ? — So as
to know which children. — How did the table get its name
in the beginning ? — God said, ' Tables must be made to eat
from and people must know what they are for.' "

Bab (8; 11) : " How did the sun get its name in the
beginning ? — It was called that. — Who by ? — People. —
What people ? — The first men, etc."

All the answers are similar. For most of the children
the sun, the sky, the mountains, the rivers, etc., were all
made by the first men, but as this question is to be studied
later (see Part III) it need not concern us here.

Finally, during the third stage, names were not given by
the makers of the things but by other men " savants," etCy

Caud (9I) : "The sun was first called ' sun ' by a man
and afterwards everybody knew. — Who was the man ? —
A learned man {un savant). — What is a ' savant ' ? — A
man who knows everything. — What did he do to find out
the names ? WTiat would you do if you were a ' savant ' ?
— / should try and think of a nayne. — How ? — In my head."
Caud then went on to say that God made the sun, fire,
etc., and that their names were given them by " savants."

The evolution of the answers given to question 2 thus
seems to show a gradual decrease in nominal realism.
During the first stage the name is in the thing. During
the second it comes from men but was made with the
thing. It is thus still, so to speak, consubstantial with
the thing and may possibly still be regarded as situated in
the thing. During the third stage the name is at last
regarded as due to the person who thinks about the thing.

The study of question 6 entirely confirms these views.
This question, it will be remembered, consists in asking

66 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

whether things have always had their names or whether
they existed before they had names. This question it will
be seen serves principally as a confirmatory proof for
question 2. The two questions should therefore not be
set immediately after one another or the child will simply
draw his conclusions from what he has just said without
considering the new problem. If however they are set in
the order suggested, the child will treat question 6 as a
fresh problem, and his answer will therefore check the
value of his answers to question 2.

In the great majority of cases the answers to questions
2 and 6 were in perfect accord, that is to say children of
the first and second stages maintained that things did not
exist before having names, while the opposite was held by
children of the third stage. Question 6, hke question 2, is
thus not correctly solved before the age of 9 and 10.

The following examples are of children who regard
things as having always had names : —

ZwA (9I) : " Which were first, things or names ? —
Things. — Was the sun there before it had its name ? —
No. — Why not ? — Because they didn't know what name to
give it (would not have known ; but the use of the con-
ditional is difficult for children). — But before God gave it its
name was there a sun ? — No, because he wouldn't know
where to make it com£ from. (The idea of non-existence
always causes difficultj'^) . — But it was there already ? —
No. — And were there clouds before they had names ? —
No, because there wasn't anyone in the world (!) " We then
tried a question outside the scheme, but naturally suggested
by Zwa's metaphysics : " If a thing wasn't there could it
have a name ? — No. — Long ago men used to believe there
was a certain fish in the sea which they called a ' chimera '
but there wasn't really any such fish ... so can't a thing
that doesn't exist have a name ? — No, because when God
saw that the things didn't exist he wouldn't have given them
names. — Have fairies got a name ? — Yes. — Then there are
things that don't exist and have a name ? — Only fairies. —
Why are there things that don't exist and yet have a
name ? — God made up other names and they don't exist."

This inability to dissociate names from things is very
curious. The following observation, involving the same

NOMINAL REALISM 67

idea, we owe to a coUeague, Dr Naville. A little girl of 9
asked : " Daddy, is there really God ? " The father
answered that it wasn't very certain, to which the child
retorted : " There must be really, because he has a name ! "

Mart (8 ; 10) : " Has the sun always had its name ? —
Yes, it always had its name when it was born. — How was
the sun bom ? — Like us." Same answer for the clouds,
the Sal^ve, etc.

Pat (10) : " Before the sun had its name was it already
there ? — Yes. — What was it called ? — The sun. — Yes, but
before it was called sun was it there ? — No. "

Bab (8 ; ii) whose answers to Question 2 have already
been quoted : " Has the sun always had its name or was
there a sun before it had a name ? — It's always had its
name. — Who gave it its name ? — People [des Messieurs). —
And before people gave it its name was it there ? — Yes. —
What was it called ? — Sun. — Who gave it its name ? —
People."

The following examples are- of children who have come
to regard things as existing before they had names. These
children are 9 or 10 years old and almost all belong to the
third stage as previously distinguished.

Mey (10) : " Tell me, did the sun exist before it had a
name ? — Yes, men gave it its name. — And were there clouds
before they had names ? — Of course."

Veil (9I) : " Did the sun exist before it had a name ? —
It was already there. — What was it called then ? — It hadn't
yet got a name."

We must now consider question 3. Since nominal
reahsm is so firmly rooted in children's minds up to the
age of 9 or 10 that the existence of things before they have
names is regarded as impossible, question 3, which concerns
how we come to know these names will strike them as
perfectly natural. Thanks to the kindness of MUes
Audemars and Lafendel, the heads of the Maison des Petits
(the training school attached to the Institut Jean Jacques
Rousseau at Geneva), we know that children themselves
sometimes ask this question spontaneously concerning the
origins of writing, a subject they question with interest.
In the cases where the child maintains that the name

68 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

emanates from the thing or that all objects were christened
by God, the question of how we then come to know that
such was the name of the sun, etc., follows of necessity.
Question 3 need not therefore be regarded as suggestive
because it presupposes nominal reahsm, but rather as
being the natural sequence of question 2. Moreover, as
with question 2 it is not correctly solved until the age of
9 or 10.

The stages revealed by means of this question are as
follows. During a first stage (5-6) the child supposes that
we came to know the names of things simply by looking
at them. We need only to look at the sun to know it is
called " sun." During the second stage {7-8) the child
claims that God told us the names of things. During a
third stage (after 9-10) the child finally realises that names
have been handed down from father to son since the time
they were invented.

It will be seen at once that these stages correspond, both
logically and chronologically with the three stages dis-
tinguished for question 2, though the detail does not
necessarily always correspond. The following are examples
of the first stage : that is, we know the sun is called " sun "
by looking at it.

Stei (5I), it will be remembered, regarded names as
coming either from the things themselves or from God:
" How did people know what was the sun's name ? — / don't
know, because they saw it. — How did you know that was its
name ? — / saw it. My mother told me. — And how did your
mother know its name ? — Because she saw the sun. . . .
We learn it at school." The name of the Saleve comes from
the Saleve itself according to Stei's account. " How did
people know it was called Saleve ? — Because it's a big
mountain. — And is that why it is called Saleve ? — My
mother told me its name. — And how did your mother know ?
— / don't know. At school. — And how did the masters of
the school know it was called Saleve ? — Because they had
seen the Saleve." As to the moon, " people knew it was called
moon because they had seen it."

Fert (7), as quoted earlier, said that the name of the
Saleve came " from the mountain. — When the first men

NOMINAL REALISM 69

came, how did they know it was called Sal^ve ? — Because
it slopes. — How did they know the sun's name ? — Because
it's bright. — But where does the name come from ? —
By itself."

Fran (9) has already said that names come from God :
" Where does the name of the sun come from ? — From
God. — And how did we know that the sun is called ' sun ' ?
— Because it's in the sky. It's not on the earth. It gives us
light in the sky. — Yes, but how did we know ? — Because
it's a great hall. It has rays. We knew it was called ' sun.'
— But how did we know its name was ' sun ' ? We might
have called it something else. — Because it gives us light. —
How did the first men know it was called * sun ' and not
something else ? — Because the big ball is yellow and the rays
are yellow, and then they just said it was the sun, and it was
the sun. (This would seen as if Fran was already suggest-
ing the arbitrary character of names but what follows
shows this to be merely appearance or at any rate that
Fran draws no conclusions from the discovery). — Who
gave the sun it's name ? — God said it was to be the sun. —
Then how did the first men know it was to be called sun ?
— Becauu it's up in the air. It's high up. — But when I
look at you I can't see what your name is. You've told
me you are called Albert. How did the first men know
the name of the sun ? — Because they had seen the sun. —
Did God tell men or did they find it out for themselves ?
— They found it out."

Lav (6^) who, as we saw, believes the name to emanate
from the thing, is convinced of having found out the names
of the sun, etc., by himself, but not difficult names, like
that of the Saleve : " You found out the name of the sun
by yourself ? — Yes. — And the Saleve ? How did you
know it was called Saleve ? Did you find that out by
yourself or did somebody tell you ? — / was told. — And the
sun ? — By myself. — And the name of the Arve ? — By
myself. . . . — And the clouds ? — / was told. — And the name
of the sky ? — / was told that too. — And the name of the
moon ? — By myself. — And did your little sister find it out
by herself or was she told ? — She found it out by herself."

These answers are very suggestive, for although they
press nominal reahsm to its utmost limit they are not
absurd. For indeed, although children may suppose they
need only to look at a thing to know its name, it does not
in the least follow that they regard the name as in some

70 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

way written on the thing. It means rather that for these
children the name is an essential part of the thing ; the
name Sal^ve impUes a sloping mountain, the name sun
implies a yellow ball that shines and has rays, etc. But
it must also be added that for these children the essence
of the thing is not a concept but the thing itself. Complete
confusion exists between thought and the things thought
of. The name is therefore in the object, not as a label,
attached to it but as an invisible quality of the object.
To be accurate we should not therefore say that the name
'' sun " implies a yellow ball, etc., but that the yellow ball
which is the sun really implies and contains the name
" sun."

This phenomenon is analogous to the " intellectual
reahsm " which M. Luquet has so clearly demonstrated
in children's drawings. They draw what they know about
an object at the expense of what they see, but they think
they are drawing exactly what they see.

We must now pass to the second stage (average age
7-8). In this stage the names of things are not to be found
merely by looking at them, but have been told us by God.

ZwA (9I) : " How did the first men know that the sun
was called sun ? — Because God told Noah. — And how did
they know that the Sal^ve was called ' Sal^ve ' ? — God told
Noah and he told it all to the learned men (savants). — But
did Noah hve in this country ? — Yes. — If a little negro
child who had never seen Geneva or the Sal^ve was to
come here would he know its name ? — No. — Why not ? —
Because he hadn't ever seen Geneva. — And would he know
the name of the sun when he looked at it ? — Yes. — Why ?
— Because he had seen it in his own country. — But would he
know it was called ' sun ' ? — Yes, because he'd remember. —
But would someone who had never seen the sun know its
name when he looked at it ? — No."

The child's conviction has only to be shaken and it will
revert to the solutions of the first stage. The following
is another example of a child hesitating in this way : —

Mart (8 ; 10) : " How do people know what the sun
is called ? — Because they've been told. — Who by ? — God

NOMINAL REALISM 71

tells us-. — Does Ged tell us things ? — No. — How do we
know it then ? — We see it. — How do we see what the sun
is called ? — We see it. — What do we see ? — The sun. —
But how do we know its name ? — We see it. — What do
we see ? — Its name. — Where do we see its name ? — When
it is fine weather. — How do we know the name for clouds ?
— Because it is had weather. — But how do we know that
is their name ? — Because we've seen them. — What. — The
clouds, etc."

Finally certain children, to escape from the difficulty,
find the solution ready-made in current theology, and
then do not hesitate to ascribe the origin of language to
literal inspiration, after the manner of de Bonald : —

Pat (10) : " And who gave the sun its name ? — God. —
And how did we know its name ? — God put it into men's
heads. — If God had not given it that name could they have
given it another ? — Yes, they could. — They knew it was
called the sun ? — No. — And the names of the fishes ? —
God put the names into men's heads."

Here is an example of the third stage (9-10) : —

Mey (10) : " And then how did we know the names ? —
They have come down from father to son." It will be re-
membered that for Mey names were invented by men
distinctly after the origin of things.

The study of question 3 has evidently laid bare certain
notions ready made or indirectly due to adult influence
as well as many spontaneous ideas. The answers of the
first stage however are entirely original and the succession
of the three stages follows a regular course, showing
clearly that it is in part due to the child's own reflection.
In fact it is not until the child is sufficiently developed to
give up the convictions of the first stage that he seeks
anything else and calls in religious ideas he has learned
from others. Moreover, the child's rejection of the idea of
a language directly due to God in favour of the much
simpler solutions found in the third stage is also quite
spontaneous.

§ 2. The Place of Names. — The youngest children
believed it only necessary to see the sun to know that it

72 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

was called " sun." The natural question to ask then is
" where is the name ? " This constitutes question 4. The
correct way to ask it is to remind the child that a thing
and its name are not the same, and then to add, " very
well, where is the name ?

Coming after question 3, it is not absurd. It may seem
much too difficult, but like the three preceding it is solved
at about the age of 9 or 10 without any suggestion on our
part. Moreover, it is not solved once and for all at a given
age as if it were a question that had long remained un-
intelligible and then suddenly become clear following on
discoveries which alone had suggested a solution. On the
contrary, from the most primitive to the correct answers
there is a gradual development. This is what really justihes
the question. Further, within each stage there is com-
plete convergence of the individual answers.

Three stages were found. During the first (5-6) the
names of things are in the things ; during the second
(7-8), the names of things are everywhere, or nowhere,
which as we shall see amounts to the same thing ; and
finally, during the third stage (9-10), names are regarded
as in the voice, then in the head and then in thought
itself. This classification involves no false symmetry.
The average age of the children composing each stage
gives the following results : 6 as the age for the first
stage, 7-: for the second, and gl for the third.

The following examples are of the first stage. The name
is in the thing. The first case is very subtle and reveals
immediately the nature of the conviction.

Fekt (7). as we have seen considers that names come
from the things themselves and that it is only necessary
to see a thing to know its name. After the examination
previously quoted he again maintained that the name of
the sun comes " by itself." " Do you think it made
itself . . . — /m M(? SM«."— A moment later : " Where is the
name of the sun ? — Inside.- -Wh'dii ? — Inside the sun.—
Where is the name of the Saleve ?— Inside. — What ?-—
Inside the Saleve.- -Where is the name of the clouds ?- -
Inside them too. — Where is your name ?...— ... Now look

NOMINAL REALISM 73

here, Pert old chap, tell me where your name is ? — / was
given it. — Yes but where is your name ? — It's written down.
— Where ? — In the hook. — Where is the name of the
Jura ? — In the Jura. — How is the name of the sun inside
the sun ? What do you mean ? — Because it's hot (!) —
If we could open the sun should we see the name ? —
No. — And why is the name of the Saleve inside the Saleve ?
— Because there are stones. — And why is the name of the
clouds inside the clouds ? — Because they are grey. — And
where is the name of the lake ? — On it. — Why ? — Because
it isn't in it. — Why not ? — Because there's water there. —
Why is the name on the lake ? — Because it can't go in, it
doesn't go into it. — But is the word ' lake ' on it ? What
does that mean ? Is it written ? — No. — Why is it on it ?
— Because it can't go into it. — Is it on top of it then ? —
No. — Where is it ? — It isn't anywhere."

It is quite clear what Fert wanted to say. The word
is in the thing, because it is part of the essence of the thing.
It is not written ; it is in the sun, because the sun is hot,
in the Saleve because the Saleve is stony, etc. There is
thus nominal realism in the sense defined in the preceding
paragraph, namely that the thing includes its name in its
intrinsic character although it is invisible. But when he
comes to the lake Fert slips into a more material realism :
he shrinks from placing the name in the lake. This
hesitation is extremely suggestive and shows better than
anything else the strength of the child's realism. But
under the sway of the absurdities into which he was led,
Fert ends by having recourse to the hypothesis which
marks the second stage and declares that the name is not
in the thing. But it was only our questions that liberated
this conviction and it is still so unstable that Fert will
be seen to reject it directly after. Just as Fert's last
words were spoken the bell for recreation rang and he
went out to play for 20 minutes, after which the examination
was continued as follows : —

" Where is the word ' lake ' ? — It is inside it because
of the water " (!) Fert thus assimilates the case of the
lake to that of the sun, the clouds, etc. . . . We therefore
tried a contrary suggestion : " How is it that people give

74 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the sun a name and then the name goes into the sun ? —
(Laughing) No, it's only we who know it. — Then where is
the name of the sun ? — It isn't anywhere. — Where would
it be if it had a place ? — It's we who know it. — Where is
the name when we think of it ? — In the sun, when we think
of the sun. — But where is the name when we think of it ?
— In ike sun. — Where is the thought when we think ? —
It's what we think. — Where is what we think ? — It doesn't
matter what (he confuses the object and the thought). —
What do we think with ? — When we remember. . . . With
the memory. — Where is the memory ? — , . . — In the feet ?
— No. — Where ? — . . . — In the head ? . . . — Yes (very hesi-
tating).— And where are names ? When you think of the
name of the sun, where is the name of the sun ? — It's we
who know it. — Yes, but where is it ? — It isn't anywhere. —
Is it in the head ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it's we who
are thinking (fresh confusion between object and thought :
the moment we think of the sun, it is no longer in our head).
— But if the name was in the head, couldn't we think of
it ? — Yes (hesitation). — Then the name is in the head ? —
In the head (without any conviction). — Aren't you sure ? —
No. — Why do you think it is not in the head ? — Because
it is in the sun."

The interest of this quotation is in Fert's determined
resistance to our increasingly pressing suggestions and
his final confession of a resdism that is still as strong as
ever : for us to think of the sun means that the name of
the sun must be "in the sun."

The other examples are all of the same type : —

Horn (5 ; 3) says that a name is " whai we use. When
we want to say something, or call someone. — Where is the
name of the sun ? — High up in the sky. — Where ? — In the
sun. — Where is your name ? — There (indicating the
thorax)." Horn then goes on to say that the name of
the Sal^ve is in the Sal^ve " because you can't walk on it. —
On what ? — On the name." After which Horn passes to
answers of a later stage.

Mart (8 ; 10) : " Where is the name of the sun ? — In
the sky. — Is it the sun or the name of the sun that is in the
sky ? — The name. — Why in the sky ? — Because it is in the
sky. . . ."

Pat (10) is on the borderline between this stage and
the next : " Where are names ? — In the head. — Where is

NOMINAL REALISM 75

the name of the sun ? — In its head." Pat had already
stated a few moments earher that the sun knew its name.
We attempted to undeceive him : "It doesn't itself know
its name ? — No, the sun doesn't know. — Then where is it's
name ? — In my head (third stage). — And where is the name
of the moon ? — In its head. — And the name of the sun ? —
In its head." (!)

In short, the study of the first stage fully bears out what
was stated in the preceding section, that in the primitive
stage the name of a thing is a part of the thing. But this
does not mean that it is inscribed on or materially re-
presented in the thing. It is part of the essence of the
thing. It is a characteristic of the thing, though not a
psychic one, for the child does not regard the voice as
immaterial, although it is invisible.

During the second stage (7-8) the name becomes dis-
sociated from the thing, but is not yet localised in the
thinking subject. It is strictly speaking everywhere or
rather wherever it has been spoken. It is "in the air."
It surrounds whoever uses it. Other children speak of it
as " nowhere," as Fert suggested for a brief moment.
This statement does not however mean that the name is
immaterial and localised in the mind, for the children who
reach this conclusion (third stage) start by saying that the
name is in the head or in the voice. Thus " nowhere "
simply means that the name is no longer localised in the
thing. It is still a primitive answer and only found
amongst children stiU to some extent in the first stage.

Roc (6|, a girl) is a typical case of this second stage :
" Now tell me, where is the name of the sun ? — In the
sky. — The sun is in the sky. But where is the name ? —
In the sky. — Where ? — Everywhere. — Where ? — In all the
houses. — Is the name of the sun here ? — Yes. — Where ? —
In schools and in the class-rooms. — Whereabouts in the class-
rooms ? — Everywhere. — Is it in this room ? — Yes. — Where
else ? — In the corners. — Where else ? — In all the little
corners (pointing to the surrounding air). — Where is the
name of the Sal^ve ? — In the houses. — Where is it in this
house ? — In the class-rooms. — Is it here ? — Yes. — Where ?
— There (looking up at the ceihng). — Where ? — In the

76 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

empty space (dans I'espace). — What is the empty space ?
— It's made up of little paths (des petits chemins pour
passer^) . — Can you see the name of the Sal^ve ? — No. —
Can you touch it ? — No. — Hear it ? — No." Same answers
for the Rhone, an exercise-book, etc. " And where is
your name ? — In the house. — Which house ? — In all the
houses which know it. — Is it here in this house ? — Yes. —
Why ? — Because we say it. — Then where is it ? — In the
school. — Where ? — In the corners. — You see that house
over there (pointing out of the window) is your name
there ? — No. — Why not ? — Because the people there don't
know it. — If someone were to come in here, would they
know that your name was here ? — No. — Could they
know ? — // someone said it. — Since when has your name
been in this room ? — To-day, just now. — How long will
it stay here ? — Till this evening. — Why ? — Because every-
one goes away then. — We shall be going at 4 o'clock. Till
when will it be here ? — Till 4 o'clock. — Why ? — Because I
shall he here. — And suppose you go but we stay, will your
name still be here ? — Yes, it'll stay. — Till when ? — Until
you go. — Where will your name be when we're gone ? —
With other people. — Who ? — People who also know it. —
How does it get to the other people ? — Through the window.
— And will your name be in the house I go to ? — Yes.
Where ? — In the kitchen (Roc lives in the kitchen at home).
— Where ? — In the little corners. — Isn't your name in our
heads ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because I said it (my name). —
Isn't it in the little corners then ? — Yes, it is."

Roc's idea is quite clear despite its paradoxical appear-
ance. The name is no longer in the thing but is associated
with the people who know it. This marks a great progress
from the first stage. But it is not yet within us, it is
localised in the voice, wherever it has been spoken it
remains in the air surrounding us. When Roc says that
the name follows us, that it goes out of the window, etc.,
she is probably nat stating anything she believes literally.
The reason she cannot imagine any other way in which
verbal knowledge accompanies us is simply that she has
never considered the question. This case thus shows :
(i) that the name is connected with the thinking subject

^ Note in the French the spontaneous etymology in associating
" espace " and "passer."

NOMINAL REALISM 77

and not with the object, but (2) that the name is external
to the subject and localised in his voice, that is to say both
in the surrounding air and in the mouth. The last part
of the examination brought this out very clearly ; Roc
wanted to admit, in accordance with our suggestion, that
her name was in the head but refused as yet to give up
the idea that it was " in the httle comers."

Stei (5^) told us spontaneously that the name of the
moon " isn't in the moon. — Where is it ? — It hasn't got a
place. — What does that mean ? — It means it isn't in the
moon. — Then where is it ? — Nowhere. — But when you say
it where is it ? — With the moon (return to first stage). — And
where is your name ? — With me. — And mine ? — With you.
— But when I know your name where is it ? — With you
when you know it. — And the name of the moon ? — With
it. — And when we know it ? — With us. — Where is it when
it's with us ? — Everywhere. — Where's that ? — In the voice."

This second stage is interesting from the point of view
of the dualism of internal and external, and strikingly
confirms what we already found with regard to thought,
that it is both in us and in the surrounding air. It is true
that in the case of words and names this is in a sense a
legitimate view, since actually a word must cross the air
before reaching the hearer's ear.

But a fundamental difference separates our view from
that of the child in the second stage ; for though he
admits that names are in the air he ignores completely
the fact that their origin lies within ourselves. The process
is centripetal and not centrifugal. The name comes from
the object and appears in the voice ; true it is then driven
forth again by the voice but in no case does it spring
directly from an internal " thought."

The third stage on the contrary is characterised by this
discovery that names are in ourselves and come from
within us. The child asserts outright that they are " in
the head." This stage occurs at the age of 9 or 10.

It is not however always easy to distinguish the third
from the second stage. The following three cases may be

78 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

regarded as intermediary : names are localised both in
the mouth and in the voice.

Bab (8 ; ii) : " ^\^le^e is the name of the sim ? — Over
there. — Where ? — By the mountain. — Is it the sun or the
name of the sun which is there ? — The sun. — And where
is the name of the sun ? — / don't know. . . . Nowhere. —
When we speak of it where is the sun's name ? — Over
there by the mountain. — Is the name or the sun over there ?
— The sun. — When we speak where is the name of the
sun ? — In the mouth. — And where is the name of the
Sal^ve ? — In the mouth. — And the name of the lake ? —
In the mouth."

Mey (io) : " Where is the name of the sun ? — In the
voice when you say it."

Caud (9^) : " Where is the word ' Sal^ve ' ? — Every-
where.— What do you mean ? Is it in this room ? — Yes.
— Why ? — Because we speak of it. — Where is it in the room ?
— In our heads. — Is it in our heads or in the room ? — It
is in our heads and in the room."

The only way to interpret these answers is to refer to
the context. As we have already seen (§ i) Bab regards
names as contemporary with things and made with them,
whilst the explanations of Caud and Mey are always much
more developed. We are therefore justified in placing
Mey and Caud in the third stage whilst Bab, for whom
names come from the things into the voice, is still in the
second stage. Caud however is still very near the second
stage and should strictly be regarded as intermediary.

The following case belongs definitely to the third stage : —

Bu?= (10) : " Where are names ? The name of the sun
for instance ? — In the head. — Whose head ? — Ours, every
one's except those who don't know it."

In short, it is evident that question 4 gives rise to
answers which develop steadily with age and which com-
pletely confirm the results obtained by the previous
questions. Question 5 must next be considered, that is,
whether things know their names : Does the sun know it
is called sun ? etc. It may certainly be questioned
whether there is not an element of animism in the nominal

NOMINAL REALISM 79

realism of the first stages. In other words is it partly
because the thing knows its name that the name is situated
in the thing ? The case of Pat is clear on this point : he
holds, as we have seen, that names are " in the heads " of
the things, that is to say that things know their names.
We found however no constant relation between nominal
realism and the attribution of consciousness to things.
Fert, for example, localises names in things, but holds that
they do not know their names, etc.

Question 5, however, yielded some interesting results.
Four types of answer were found. First, there are a few
children who suppose everything to be aware of its name : —

Fran (9) : " Does a fish know its name ? — Yes, because
it can he called a salmon or a trout. — Does a fly know its
name ? — Yes, because we can call it a fly or a bee or a wasp."
Similar answers for a stone, a table, etc. " Does a pencil
know its name ? — Yes. — How ? — Because it is written on
it where it is made. — Does it know it is black ? — No. —
Does it know it is long ? — No. — But it knows it has got a
name ? — Yes, because there were people who said that it should
he a pencil." Clouds cannot see us, " because they haven't
any eyes," but they know their names " because they know
they are called clouds, etc."

Secondly, there are a much greater and more interesting
number of children (more interesting since one is less
inclined to think they are romancing) who confine this
knowledge solely to bodies that move : —

Mart (8 ; 10) : " Does a dog know its name ? — Yes. —
Does a fish know it is called a fish ? — Of course. — Does the
sun know its name ? — Yes, because it knows it's got its
name. — Do clouds know they are called clouds ? — Yes,
because they've got a name and they know their name. — Do
matches know they are called matches ? — No, Yes. — Yes
or no ? — No, because they are not alive. — Does the moon
know its name ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it's alive, it
moves (!) — Does the wind know its name ? — Yes. — Why ?
— Because it makes it windy. — Does the Rhone know its
name ? — Yes, because it is it that is the Rhone (!). — Is it
ahve ? — Yes, because it flows into the Arve. — Does the lake
know its name ? — Yes, because it moves. — Does it know it
moves ? — Yes, because it is it that moves (!)."

8o CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Thirdly, there are those children who consider that only
animals and plants or animals alone, know their names.
Even children of advanced intelligence, Uke Mey, will
maintain that perhaps trees know their names.

Mey (io) : " Does a dog know its name ? — Yes. — A
fish ? — Ye&, because if we know we belong to the world [i.e.
that we are men) fish ought to know it too. — And does the
sun know it is called the sun ? — No. — Why not ? — Because
it isn't alive. — ^^Does the wind know its name ? — No. — Do
the trees know that is what they are called 1—^No, because
we couldn't make them know it. — Why not ? — They wouldn't
understand. — Then they don't know their name? — Perhaps
they may, perhaps not. — Why ' perhaps not ' ? — Trees can't
learn things. — And why ' perhaps they may ' ? — They see
other trees besides themselves and think they are the same
thing. — And what does that do ? — They know they are oaks
but they can't see it."

Finally, there are children who refuse a knowledge of
names to everything. The average age of this group was
9-10. The children who associated knowledge of name
with movement (like Mart) had an average age of 7. This
evolution agrees closely with what wiU be found later
(Part II) in the study of children's animism.

§ 3. The Intrinsic Value of Names. — So far we have
studied names under what might be called their onto-
logical aspect, that is, their existence, place, and origin.
There remains the logical aspect ; are names merely signs
or have they an intrinsic logical value ? The two problems
are strictly dependent on one another and it is evident
that names so far as they are situated in things must be
regarded as absolute. But though the ontological reaUsm
and the logical realism of names may have the same roots,
their persistence may perhaps differ. This — -that logical
reaUsm lasts much longer than ontological — is precisely
what we shall hope to show. Questions 7 and 8 are not
in fact solved before the age of 10 and 11 or 12 and even
those children who localise the name in the head and who
believe in the recent origin of names, continue to hold that
names imply not the thing but the idea of the thing ; for

NOMINAL REALISM 8i

example, the sun is called thus because it is bright and
round, etc.

To begin with question 8 — could names be changed ?
Two stages were distinguished. Before the age of lo the
children said not, after an average age of lo they agreed
that they could. Between the two were several inter-
mediate cases. The following examples are of the first
stage : —

Fert (7) : " Are you called Albert ? — Yes. — Could you
have been called Henry ? Would it have been just the
same ? — No. — Could the Saleve have been called ' Jura '
and the Jura ' Saleve ' ? — No. — Why not ? — Because they
are not the same thing. — And could the moon have been
called ' sun ' and the sun ' moon ' ? — No. — Why not ? —
Because the sun makes it warm and the moon gives light."

Roc (6|) admits that God might have changed the
names : " Would they have been right then or wrong ? —
Wrong. — Why ? — Because the moon must he the moon and
not the sun and the sun must he the sun ! "

Fran (9) : " Could the sun have been given another
name ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it's nothing else hut
the sun, it couldn't have another name."

ZwA (9^) knows some German and might have been
expected to understand the relative nature of names.
But he did not : " Could names be changed and things
given other names ? You are called Louis, could you have
been called Charles ? — Yes. — Could this chair have been
called ' Stuhl ' ? — Yes, because it's a German word. — Why
are there other names in German ? Why don't they talk
hke we do ? — Because they can speak a different way. —
Have things got more than one name ? — Yes. — Who gave
them the German names ? — God and the Germans. — You
say names could be changed. Could the sun have been
called ' moon ' and the moon ' sun ' ? — No. — Why not ? —
Because the sun shines brighter than the moon. — Have you
a brother ? — Gilbert. — Could Gilbert have been called
' Jules ' ? — Yes. — Well, couldn't the sun have been called
' moon ' ? — No. — Why not ? — Because the sun can't change,
it can't become smaller. — But if every one had called the
sun ' moon,' and the moon ' sun,' would we have known
it was wrong ? — Yes, because the sun is always bigger, it
always stays like it is and so does the moon. — Yes, but the
sun isn't changed, only its name. Could it have been

82 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

called . . . etc. ? — No. — How would one know it was
wrong ? — Because the moon rises in the evening, and the
sun in the day."

Bus (lo) says that nothing could be changed : " because
they wanted to give the sun the name of sun. — If in the
beginning the first men had given different names, would
we have seen by now that they were wrong or would we
never have known ? — We should have seen. — How ? —
Because the sun is hot and the moon is not hot."

The following is an intermediate case in which names
might have been changed but " it wouldn't have been so
good " : —

Dup (7|, a girl, very forward) : " Could the sun have
been called ' stoll ' ? — Yes. — No one would have noticed
anything ? — No. — Could the table have been called
' chair ' ? — Yes, no. — Could it or not ? — Yes, it could." A
star was called a " star " " because people thought that name
would go best. — Why ? — / don't know. — Could it have been
called ' nail ' ? — It wouldn't have been so good, etc."

Dup shows a great advance on the preceding subjects
in having partly reahsed the conventional character of
names and above all in having understood that if names
had been different no one would have known. None the
less she seems to believe in a certain harmony between
the name and the idea of the thing (an etymological
instinct, of which many examples occur later) without
venturing definitely to state its nature.

The following examples of the second 'stage show
children who realise that the character of names is not
entirely arbitrary — that is a later stage — but conventional.

Mey (io) : " Could you have been called Henry ? —
Yes. — Could the Jura have been called ' Saleve ' and the
Saleve ' Jura ' ? — Yes, because- men could have changed
names or made them the opposite. — Could the sun have
been called ' moon ' ? — Why not ? — Could it have ? Could
that (a table) have been called a chair and that (a chair)
a table ? — Yes. — If the sun had been called ' moon,'
would we have known it was wrong ? — No. — Why not ?
— We couldn't have known it was wrong. — Why not ? —

NOMINAL REALISM 83

Because they would have given the name ' moon ' to the sun.
They wouldn't have seen any difference.

Bab (8; 11) after having given a number of primitive
answers suddenly readised his sophistry and replied to the
last question quite correctly : " Could the Sal^ve have
been called ' Jura ' and the Jura ' Saleve ' ? — Yes. —
Why ? — Because it's the same thing. — Could the sun have
been called ' moon ' and the moon ' sun ' ? — Yes. — Should
we have known the names were changed ? — Yes. — Why ?
— Because we'd have been told. — If no one had told us should
we have known ? — No. — Why not ? — Because names
aren't marked on things."

Thus at about the age of 9 or 10, that is to say just at
the age when all the preceding questions were solved, the
child admits that names could have been changed and that
no one would have known. But this answer does not alone
prove that the name has no intrinsic value. It simply
proves the dechne of ontological reaUsm : names are no
longer tied up to the things they represent.

Indeed, question 7, " Why does a particular object
have a particular name ? " is not solved until after
question 8, and it is in fact the hardest of all the
questions.

Success in answering question 8 simply shows that a
child regards a name as conventional — it was decided to
call the sun ' sun,' yet there is nothing in its nature which
tells us to call it thus. But the name is not yet arbitrary ;
it is not a pure sign. On the contrary it is justified on
etymological grounds. The word ' sun ' involves the idea
of shining, round, etc. It is not before the age of 11 or
12 that the child gives up making such justifications and
that question 7 is really solved.

Question 7 gives rise to the following stages : Until
the age of 10, all names contain the idea of the thing.
During the second stage (10 and 11) there is simply some
sort of harmony between the name and the idea ; ^ the
name ' fits,' goes well, etc. That is to say the idea of the
thing is stiU present in some measure, but other names
containing the same idea might have been chosen. Finally,

84 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

after ii or 12 the name contains in itself nothing. It is
purely a sign.
The following are examples of the first stage : —

Horn (5 ; 3) : " Why is the sun called what it is ? —
Because it behaves as if ii was the sun."

Roc (6) : " Why was the sun given that name ? —
Because it shines. — And the Sal^ve ? — Because it is a
mountain. — Why are mountains called ' mountains ' ? —
Because they are all white."

Bab (8 ; 11) succeeded with question 8 but not with
question 7 : " Why is the sun Ccdled what it is ? — Because
it is all red. — Why is the moon called what it is ? — Because
it is all yellow. — And the Sal^ve ? — Because it is called the
SaUve. — Why } — Because . . . — For a reason or for no
reason? — For a reason. — Why? — . . . — Why are clouds
called hke that ? — Because they are all grey. — Does
' clouds ' mean that they are all grey ? — Yes."

Veil (9^) also succeeded with question 8. But he
beheves the sun is so called " because it heats " ; a table
" because it is used for writing," etc.

Bus (10) : The Sal^ve is so called " because it rises
up" ; the stars " because they are that shape " ; a stick
" because it is thick." " Does the stick mean that it is
thick ^—It is long."

Fran (9) : The Sal^ve is called " Saleve " " because it
is a mountain which slopes on all sides " (see Fran's case,

§1).

These examples might be multipHed indefinitely. They
are curiously reminiscent of the cases of syncretism
already studied {Language and Thought, Chapter VI) and in
particular of the cases of " justification at all cost." The
principle is the same in all : a word is always associated
with its context until it comes to be regarded as implying
the whole context.

It is clearly in this verbal syncretism and in the nominal
realism with which it is connected that the origin wiU be
found for what M. Bally has called the " etymological
instinct ", that is the tendency to attribute to every name
an origin justifying it.

In the second stage may be grouped those children who,

NOMINAL REALISM 85

whilst not so boldly affirming the connection between
names and their content yet feel that there is none the
less a harmony.

Dup (7^, a girl) : " Why are the stars called ' stars ' ?
— Because people thought it the best name. — Why ? — /
don't know. — (see earlier Dup's answers to question 8).
The sun was given the name ' sun,' " because the sun gives
more light (than the moon) and I think too that the name
of sun goes best for the sun, because the people who gave
it that name thought it suited it best."

Mey (10) after having solved question 8 said, however,
that the sun was so called : " because people thought it
was a good name and a bright one."

Dup and Mey do not say that the name of the sun
impUes light. They merely say there should be a connec-
tion. In principle this is true, but what in fact they
maintain is not the result of a historical hypothesis but is
simply the last traces of nominal reaUsm.

Among the children who solved question 7, Mey was
the only one we have so far found who succeeded before
the age of 11 or 12, and he only arrived at the solution at
the end of the examination and after first giving the answers
quoted above.

Mey (10) ..." Why is the moon called by that
name ? — Just, because it is, for no reason. — Why is the
Saleve so called ? — It's a name people found for it. — Could
it have been caUed ' Nitchevo ' ? — Certainly, because that's
a name too."

Gen (11) : " Why is the sun called what it is ? — Not
for any reason, it's just a name. — And the moon ? —
No reason. Anything can be called by any name you like."

It is thus not until question 7 is solved that the child
can be supposed to have understood the arbitrary nature
of names. Nominal realism in its ontological form is
discarded after the age of 9 or 10, but the reaUsm of the
logical form does not start to disappear before 11 or 12.
In short, logical reahsm arises from ontological realism
but lasts longer.

§ 4. Conclusions. — The relation of this study of nominal
reahsm to our previous research on the notion of thought
remains to be shown.

86 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

For the child, to think is to deal in words. This belief
involves three confusions, and three dualisms arise in the
process of their elimination. First, there is the confusion
between the sign and the thing : thought is regarded as
inseparable from its object.^ There is the confusion
between internal and external : thought is regarded as
situated both in the air and in the mouth. Finally, there
is the confusion between matter and thought : thought
is regarded as a material substance, a voice, a whisper, etc.

Does the study of nominal realism confirm the existence
of these confusions and does it reveal how the child
becomes aware of the corresponding dualisms ? It
seems so.

To begin with, the confusion of sign and thing is so
evidently rooted in the very nature of nominal realism
that it is unnecessary to pursue the point.

The confusion of internal and external is, on the other
hand, less obvious at first glance. However, the existence
of the second stage, which relates to the location of names,
is clear evidence of this confusion. In fact when the child
first distinguishes the name from the thing named he does
not directly place the name " in the head " : he starts
rather by situating it in the surrounding air, " every-
where " where it is spoken of. In other words, voice is
at the same time both within and outside ourselves. This
is precisely what we found in regard to thought, which is
at the same time both " outside " and in the mouth.

The third confusion is not actually found but is obviously
implied in the second.

The ages at which these three corresponding duaUsms
appear has only to be studied to reveal how the child
comes to discover the non-material nature of thought.

Until the age of 6 or 7 names come from the things
themselves. They were discovered by looking at the things.
They are in the things, etc. This first and crudest form
of the confusion between sign and thing disappears some-

1 M. Delacroix in Le Langage et la Pensie speaks of " adherence du
signe."

NOMINAL REALISxM 87

where about the age of 7 or 8. The disappearance of the
confusion between internal and external comes at about
9 or 10, when names are first localised " in the head."
But as we saw with the notion of thought, it is not before
the age of 11 that thought is regarded as immaterial.

It would therefore seem as if the child first realised that
signs were distinct from things and was then led by this
discovery increasingly to regard thought as internal. This
continuous and progressive differentiation of signs and
things, together with the growing realisation of the
subjectivity of thought, appears gradually to lead him to
the notion that thought is immaterial.

What psychological factors are responsible for this
progressive distinction between signs and things ? Most
probably the child's growing awareness of his own thought,
which takes place invariably after the age of 7 or 8.
Its manifestations have been studied elsewhere {Judgment
and Reasoning, Chapter IV, §§ i and 2). But this awareness
is itself dependent on social factors, as we attempted to
show : it is through contact with others and the practice of
discussion that the mind is forced to realise its subjective
nature and thus to become aware of the process of thought
itself.

CHAPTER 111

DREAMS

The child is a realist and a realist because he has not
yet grasped the distinction between subject and object
and the internal nature of thought. Obviously, therefore,
he will be confronted by grave difficulties when he attempts
to explain the most subjective of all phenomena — dreams.
The study of children's conceptions as to the nature of
dreams is thus of great interest and from a twofold point
of view, for the explanation of the dream supposes the
duaUty first of the internal and the external, and secondly
of thought and matter.

If this research is to be of value we must as before set
aside all we have learned from the analysis of primitive
mentahty and in particular the important work of M-
Levy-Bruhl. We shall no doubt come across analogies
between the child and the primitive at every step ; this
will be, however, in the course of studying the child himself
without any preconceived ideas, rather than because we
are deliberately seeking such analogies.

The technique to be followed in determining what
genuinely are children's ideas concerning dreams is more
delicate than that of the preceding researches. It is
probable, in fact, that children ask many questions con-
cerning their dreams and are given the most contra-
dictory explanations, particularly regarding nightmares,
so that it is necessary to be constantly on guard and to
try to confirm each result by complementary questions.

The procedure we found most satisfactory consisted of
an inquiry bearing on four points, which should always

88

DREAMS 89

be given in a fixed order. The first concerns the origin
of the dream. The question is stated thus : " You know
what a dream is ? You dream sometimes, at night ?
Then tell me where the dreams come from ? " This
question is usually sufficient to start the child talking,
particularly when it believes dreams to come " from the
head." When the origin is held to be external, the ques-
tion must be pressed further, and an explanation given
as to " how," etc. A particularly equivocal answer is :
" It's the night that makes dreams." Some children mean
by this simply that it is at night that one dreams, while
others, on the contrary, mean that a black smoke (see
Chapter IX, § 2) causes the formation of dreams, that is to
say of deceptive images, in the room (and not in the head) .
In short, one must always get to the roots, yet without
allowing the question itself to be suggestive and without
wearying the child and goading him into the " answer at
random."

The second point, the place of the dream, completes
the first and forms an indispensable check on it. When
the child says that dreams come " from the head," two
completely different meanings are possible. The child
may believe either that the dream is in the head or he
may think that the head produces a dream in the room.
Dreams may be regarded as either internal or external
just as much when they come from God as when they are
made by the night. It is, therefore, of primary import-
ance to determine where the child locates dreams. More-
over, this question is the counterpart to those bearing on
the place of thought and of names studied earher. But
in the case of dreams the question raises difficulties. If
put thus : " While you dream, where is the dream ? "
the danger Hes naturally in the child knowing the dream
to be in the head yet saying " in front," because it thinks
it is being asked where the dream appears to be. The
answer " in front of us " may thus sometimes mean that
the dream is conceived as really in front and at other
times simply that the dream appears to be in front of us.

90 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

This point calls for the closest attention. The questions
must then be asked, " Yes, in front of us, but is it really
and truly in front of us or does it only seem to be in front
of us ? " Or with the very little ones, " But is there really
something in front of us or is it only make-beheve ? " etc.
But the majority of the children who describe the dream
as " in front of us " are just those who are unable to make
this distinction between " being " and " seeming " and
cannot, therefore, understand the controlling question.
This must, however, be proved in each case.

Also it is important to start with the first point before
asking, " where are dreams." Otherwise there may be
suggestion by perseveration, in the sense that the child
who describes the dream as "in front of us " may then
be tempted to seek the origin of the dream as external
also, though he would not have done so if the question
of origin had been asked first.

The third point concerns the organ of the dream.
" What do you dream with ? " Finally, the fourth point
is the " why " of dreams. This question is suggestive in
the sense that to ask : " Why did you dream of your
mother, of school, etc. . . ." is to suggest a purpose. In
fact all the children over the age of 7 or 8 gave a causal
explanation (" because I thought of it during the day,
etc."), whilst only the youngest gave the " Why " a pre-
causal interpretation. This is a question to be gone into.

It may also be mentioned that to avoid the possibiUty
of suggestion by perseveration, with two or three ex-
ceptions, none of the children we questioned on the
subject of dreams had previously been questioned on
name?, and only half had already been questioned on
thought.

The answers obtained can be classified as belonging to
three distinct stages. During the first (approximately
5-6) the child believes the dream to come from outside
and to take place within the room and he thus dreams
with the eyes. Also, the dream is highly emotional :
dreams often come " to pay us out," " because we've done

DREAMS 91

something we ought not to have done," etc. During the
second stage (average age yS) the child supposes the
source of the dream to be in the head, in thought, in the
voice, etc., but the dream is in the room, in front of him.
Dreaming is with the eyes ; it is looking at a picture
outside. The fact that it is outside does not mean that
it is true : the dream is unreal, but consists in an image
existing outside, just as the image of an ogre may exist,
without there actually being a real ogre. Finally, during
the third stage (about 9-10), the dream is the product of
thought, it takes place inside the head (or in the eyes)^
and dreaming is by means of thought or else with the
eyes, used internally.

§ I. First Stage : The Dream comes from outside
AND REMAINS EXTERNAL. — It seems most probable that
the first time a child dreams it confuses the dream with
reahty. On waking the dream is still held to be true and
objective, and, above all, the memory of the dream be-
comes confused with ordinary memories. With regard
to nightmares this seems quite evident. Every one knows
how hard it can be to calm a child who has just woken
from a nightmare, and how impossible it is to convince
him that the objects he dreamt of did not really exist.
To illustrate the confusion which takes place between the
dream and the recollection of actual events the author
has collected several typical cases from amongst the
personal recollections of his collaborators.

Here is an example : —

"All my childhood I believed that a train had really
passed over me. I can remember the exact scene of the
adventure : a level-crossing which really existed quite near
the house where my parents lived. In my false memory, my
mother had just crossed the line pushing a baby in a pram
when I realised a train was almost upon me. I had barely
time to throw myself down on my back and I can still see the
carriages passing over my head at top-speed. Afterwards I
got up perfectly safe and sound and rejoined my mother.
That is the false memory which I believed true all through
my childhood. It was not till about the age of 12 that my

92 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

parents undeceived me, when I was boasting one day {for
the first time !) of having been under a train. The exactitude
of the memory convinces me it must be of a dream which had
centred round the image of the level-crossing I knew so well."

In the same way, another of our collaborators believed
during a great part of her childhood that her parents had
attempted to drown her in the sea. Here again, the visual
exactitude of the memory certainly seems to indicate a
dream.

MUe Feigin has had the happy idea of studying how
the child gradually comes to distinguish the dream from
reahty. She has found that, up till about the age of 9,
it is not the absurdities of the dream which aid the child's
judgment but that on the contrary, contradiction with the
facts of reality as well as opposition to the views of others
are used as criteria at a still earlier age. But in all cases,
the inquiry has shown that the distinction between the
dream and reality is not always easy and that emotional
dreams, in particular, have a tendency to be completely
confused with reahty.

How then does the child explain the dream the first
time he is able to distinguish it from reahty ? Evidently
he will regard the dream as a sort of deceptive reahty —
just as an Epinal picture ^ may be deceptive by repre-
senting things which do not exist — but objective since the
picture in the book is made with paper and colours that
really exist. This may easily be observed. Sully quotes
the sf)ontaneous remark of a child who did not want to
go back to a certain room, " because it is full of dreams."

Banf (4^) describes the dream as made of " hghts "
which are in the room. These hghts are " little lamps, like
bicycles " {i.e. hke the lamps on bicycles at night). These
hghts come "from the moon. It breaks up. The lights
come in the night." In other words Banf attributes the
" Ughts " which make the dreams to the most striking
source of hght — the moon, which divides into quarters.

^ Coloured illustrations to children's fairy-tales, etc., so-called from
the town where they were first produced during the eighteenth century.
[Translator's note.]

DREAMS

93

Had (6 ; 6)*: " You know what a dream is ? — When you
are asleep and you see something. — Where does it come
from ? — The sky. — Can you see it ? — No{/) . . . yes, when
you're asleep. — Could 1 see it if I was there ? — No. —
Why not ? — Because you wouldn't he asleep. — Can you
touch it ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it is in front of us."
And later : " When you are asleep you dream and you see
them (the dreams), but when you aren't asleep you don't see
them."

KuN (7 ; 4) says that dreams come "from the night. —
Where do they go ? — Everywhere. — What do you dream
with ? — With the mouth. — Where is the dream ? — In the
night. — Where does it happen ? — Everywhere. In rooms,
in houses. — Whereabouts ? — In the bed. — Can you see it ? —
No, because it is only at night. — Would anyone know you
were dreaming ? — No, because it's near us. — Could you
touch it ? — No, because you're asleep when you dream. —
Is the dream made of thought ? — No. — Where is it ? — In
the night. — Where ? — Near. — Is it the thoughts we think
with ? — No." And later : " Could anyone see it ? —
No, because if you looked at it, it would go."

Sci (6) : " WTiere does a dream come from ? — From
the night. — What is it ? — It's the evening. — What is the
night like ? — It is black — How are dreams made ? — They
come when you shut your eyes. — How ? — / don't know. —
Where are the dreams made ? — Out there (pointing to the
window). — What are dreams made of ? — Black. — Yes,
but of what ? — Of light. — Where do they come from ? —
From the lights outside. — Where are they ? — There are some
out there " (pointing to the street-lamps). " Why do
dreams come ? — Because the light makes them." (On the
subject of hght, see Sci's remarks on vision, Chapter I, § 2.)
Later on Sci remarked that dreams come "from the sky. —
What sends them ? — The clouds. — Why the clouds ? —
They come." This behef that the night comes from the
clouds is in fact frequent (see Chapter IX, § 2). Sci has
thus returned to his idea that dreams are due to the night.

BouRG (6) : " When do you dream ? — At night. — Where
is the dream when you are dreaming ? — In the sky. — And
then ? . . . — It comes in the night." " Can you touch the
dream ? — No, you can't see and besides you're asleep. —
But if you were not asleep ? — No, you can't see a dream.
— When you are asleep, could another person see yom*
dream ? — No, because you're asleep. — Why can't one see
it ? — Because it is night. — Where do dreams come from ?

94 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

— From the sky." To dream, there must thus be some-
thing in the room. But one cannot see it clearly because
one is asleep and it is night-time. But, strictly, one ought
to be able to see it.

Barb (5|) : " Do you ever have dreams ? — Yes, I
dreamt I had a] hole in my hand. — Are dreams true ? —
No, they are pictures (images) we see (!) — Where do they
come from ? — From God. — Are your eyes open or shut
when you dream ? — Shut. — Could I see your dream ? —
No, you would he too far away. — And your mother ? — Yes^
hut she lights the light. — Is the dream in the room or inside
you ? — It isn't in me or I .shouldn't see it (!) — And could
your mother see it ? — No, she isn't in the hed. Only my
little sister sleeps with me."

Zeng (6) : " Where do dreams come from ? — They come
from the night. — How ? — / don't know. — What do you
mean by ' they come from the night ' ? — The night makes
them. — Does the dream come by itself ? — No. — What
makes it ? — The night. — Where is the dream ? — It's made
in the room. — Where does the dream come from ? — From
the sky. — Is the dream made in the sky ? — No. — Where is
it made ? — In the room"

Ris (8|, a girl) : " Where do dreams come from ? —
From the night. — Where is the dream when you are dream-
ing ? — In my hed. — Where ? — In the room quite near, beside
me. — Where does the dream come from ? — From the night.
— Should I see it, if I was near you ? — No. — And do you
see it ? — No {cp. Bourg). — Then what is it ? — . . . — Is it
made of something or not of anything ? — Of something. —
Of paper ? — (laughing) No. — Of what ? — Of words. — And
what are words ? — Talking {en voix). Where does the
talking in the dream come from ? — From the sky. — Where
in the sky ?^. . . — How is it made in the sky ? . . .
Does the dream come of itself or does something send it. —
It comes hy itself. — Why do we dream ? — Because we think
of something." Ris's- view is evidently advanced! But
she identifies thought with speech (la voix) and continues
to believe the dream comes from without : " What is
talking (la voix) made of ? — Air — Where does it come
from ? — The air. — And the dream ? — From the sky."

Mont (7 ; 0) declares that the things he sees in dreams
are " against the wall. — Should I see them if I was there ?
Yes. — Where do they come from ? — From outside. — What
sends them? — People {des Messieurs). — What do you
dream of ? — A man heing run over. — Is he in front of you

DREAMS 95

when you dream or inside you ? — In front of me. — Where ?
— Under my window. — Should I have seen him if I. had
been there ? — Yes. — Did you see him in the morning ? —
No. — Why not ? — Because it was a dream. — WTiere did
this dream come from ? — . . . — Did you make it or some-
one else ? — Someone else. — Who ? — A man my father knows
(the one who was run over) . — Does he make all the dreams ?
— Only that one. — And the others ? — Other men."

Engl (8^) : " Where do dreams come from ? — / don't
know. — Say what you think. — From the sky. — How ?
— . . . — Where do they come ? — To the house. — Where is
the dream whilst you are dreaming ? — Beside me. — Are
your eyes shut when you dream ? — Yes. — Where is the
dream ? — Over there. — Can one touch it ? — No. — See it ?
— No. — Could someone beside you see it ? — No. — What
do we dream with ? — The eyes."

We have made a point of multiplying these examples
to show that though the detail of all these answers differs
widely, in their broad Unes they are similar. In fact, for
all these children the dream is an image or a voice which
comes from outside and manifests itself in front of their
eyes. This image is not real in the sense of representing
real events, but as an image it does exist objectively. It
is external to the child and is in no sense mental. The
nature of this beUef must briefly be made clear.

To begin with, it will have been noticed that emphasis
was put up>on the question : " Would someone beside
you have been able to see the dream ? " The most
realistic among the children, like Had and Mont, agreed
that they would, since they regarded the dream as a
ready-made image which comes and takes its place beside
the dreamer and which is derived from the objects which
figure in the dream. Others, like Bourg, Engl, etc., held
the contrary view, but the interesting point here was that
they claimed that neither could they see the dream. This
was because at the moment they were answering the.
question, they were thinking not of the actual sensations
which make up what is seen in the dream, but of that
something which, so they say, manufactures the dream
in the room : " You can't see the dream," according to

96 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Bourg, " because it is night." Here the child is less a
realist. What he situates in the room is simply the cause
of the dream. This by no means indicates that he locaUses
dreams in the head. Although they can answer that their
eyes are shut whilst they dream, these children all believe,
nevertheless, that it is " with the eyes " that they see the
images that the cause of the dream makes outside. It is
as if there was beside them a something impinging on
their eyes but invisible to all. Compared with the group
represented by Mont these children are in the first stage
of subjectivism, but they are still realist. Compared with
the later stages, the children of the first group are still
entirely in the grip of a primitive realism, whilst the
reaUsm of those in the second stage is due to the necessities
of explanation, that is to say is a derivative type of realism.
Moreover, the two types of reply must evidently coexist
in each child.

In the matter of the locahsing of the dream, these two
groups of answers correspond to two distinct types of
belief. According to one type (that of Mont, etc.) the
dream is located at the actual spot of which one dreams ;
if the dream is of a man in the street, the dream is in the
street " under my window." But yet there is nothing
real there, because it is a dream, in other words an
illusion ; but the image as image does exist materiaUy
" under my window." There is thus primitive realism
or confusion between " being " and " seeming " : the
dream seems to be in the street, therefore it is in the
street. It must, however, be insisted that this confusion
is never complete with those children who realise that
dreams are Olusory. In other words, those children who
locate the dream in the sfreet also beUeve (through
participation, and in defiance of logic) that it is in the
room. This is the case of Mont who regards the dream
as at the same time " against the waU " of his room and
also in the street. We shall meet more cases of this type
presently (see cases of Metr and of Giamb), so that it is
unnecessaiy to pursue the point now.

DREAMS 97

The second type of belief consists simply in admitting
that the dream is in the room. This is a realism of a much
more interesting kind, since it is not directly dependent
on the illusions of the dream itself. It would seem as if
children ought to regard the dream as either in the things
of which they dream, through primitive realism (as Mont
does partially) or as in the head. As a matter of fact,
however, children place the dream beside them because
they are at the same time too advanced to believe any
longer in the reality of the dream but also not yet advanced
enough to regard images as subjective and internal repre-
sentations. To place the dream in the room is thus a
compromise between a thoroughgoing reahsm and sub-
jectivism. " Being " is no longer confused with " seem-
ing " ; but the internal nature of images is not yet under-
stood.

Now this beHef in the external nature of images is
extremely insistent. One is tempted at first to think the
children have not understood the question and think they
are being asked where the dream seems to be. But this
is not the case. Barb, for example, after having defined
the dream as " pictures that you see," absolutely refuses,
despite our suggestion, to make the dream internal :
" It isn't in me or I shouldn't see it." The following is a
yet more striking case, because the child is advanced, has
almost given up the behefs of the first stage and almost
spontaneously made the suggestion — to reject it, however
— that the dream is within himself : —

Metr (5 ; q) : " Where does the dream come from ? —
/ think you sleep so well thai you dream. — Does it come
from us or from outside ? — From outside. — What do we
dream with ? — / don't know. — With the hands ? . . .
With nothing ? — Yes, with nothing. — When you are in
bed and you dream, where is the dream ? — In my bed,
under the blanket. I don't really know. If it was in my
stomach (!) the bones would be in the way and I shouldn't
see it. — Is the dream there when you sleep ? — Yes, it is in
my bed beside me." We tried suggestion : " Is the dream
in your head ? — It is I that am in the dream : it isn't in

98 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

my head (!) — When you dream, you don't know you are in
bed. You know you are walking. You are in the dream.
You are in bed, but you don't know you are. — Can two
people have the same dream ? — There are never two dreams
(alike). — Where do dreams come from ? — / don't know.
They happen. — Where ? — In the room and then afterward
they come up to the children. They come by themselves. —
You see the dream when you are in the room, but if I
were in the room, too, should I see it ? — No, grown-ups
{les Messieurs) don't ever dream. — Can two people ever
have the same dream ? — No, never. — When the dream is
in the room, is it near you ? — Yes, there ! (pointing to
30 cms. in front of his eyes)."

This case is remarkable. It contains the decisive state-
ment : " It is I that am in the dream : it isn't in my
head " ; in other words : The dream is something inside
which I am shut up and so I can't at the same time have
it all inside me. These words and the commentary follow-
ing them are highly instructive. Firstly, Metr makes
very clearly the distinction between " being in bed " and
" knowing you are in bed " — " You are in bed, but you
don't know you are." Secondly, Metr (who, by the way,
appears to have only one word for " knowing " and
" beUeving ") gives as the proof that the dream cannot
be in him, the fact that he, Metr, is " in his dream." And
to show that he really is in his dream he adds that when
he is dreaming he " knows," that is to say he beUeves,
that he is walking, etc. In other words, whilst knowing
the dream to be unreal (and admitting that he alone can
see his dream), Metr thinks that he is himself represented
in his dream, perhaps only as an image, but as an image
of which he himself is the source. Like Mont, Metr thus
beheves that there is participation between the image
dreamed and the thing of which it is the image. In his
arguments, however, he is exactly on a level with a child
ol the second stage, Fav, whom we shall study later. From
the examples given so far, it may, therefore, be concluded
that as regards the localisation of images, the dream is
conceived as a picture situated beside the child, but a

DREAMS 99

picture interacting with the things it represents and con-
sequently coming partly from the places where these
things are situated.

The next point to consider concerns the substance of
the dream. In this respect the answers of children of the
first stage are identical with those of the second, except
in a simple case where the dream is described as being
made " of night " or of " black." This statement is
directly bound up with the belief in the external origin
of the dream ; the dream comes from outside, from the
night (that is to say from a black smoke), it is, there-
fore, made " of night." In the other cases, the fabric of
the dream consists of that characteristic with which the
dream itself is most highly charged. Those children who
are struck by the visual character of their dreams — much
the greatest number — believe the dream to be made
" of Hght." Those who have heard voices in their dreams
suppose the dream to be made " of words," that is to say
ultimately, " of air."

In considering the origin of the dream we found two
types of answer co-existing in the majority of children.
First are those who offer no real explanation or whose
explanations are simply elaborated from their ideas on
the substance of the dream. For example, a child will
say the dream comes " from the sky," " from outside,"
" from the night," " from the room," all of which state-
ments amount to much the same. When the child stresses
the luminous character of the dream he has recourse to
such sources of light as the moon or the street-lamps to
explain its origin.

What is more interesting is that certain children, on
the other hand, seem to believe that it is the people they
dream of who produce the dream. Thus Mont seems to
suggest that it is the man of whom he dreamed (the man
who was run over and who is a friend of his father) who
himself caused the dream. Mile Rodrigo, who set the
same questions to some hundred Spanish children, obtained
a large number of answers according to which dreams are

TOO CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

sent not only by God or the devil (which proves nothing
in itself) but principally by " wolves " (the child having
dreamed of wolves), or " the king " (of whom the child
had dreamed), or " men " or " the poor " (the child having
dreamed of gipsies), etc. There would thus seem to be
participation here also between the person dreamed of
and the dream itself ; in other words it would seem that
the person dreamed of is in part the cause of the dream,
although he need not appear in the dream in flesh and
blood.

But on this point care must be taken not to endow the
child with a systematic theory but rather to unravel the
real significance of his answers. The question as to the
" Why " of dreams must first be treated. It appears, as
we shall attempt to show, that certain children regard
dreams as a sort of punishment, and it is this character
of retribution which leads these children to suppose that
the persons they dream 6i must be responsible for the
origin of the dream.

The following are examples : —

Sci (6), as we have already seen, attributes dreams to
the street-lamps, but this does not prevent him from
supposing dreams to have a purpose : — " Why do we
have dreams ? — Because the light makes them. — Why ? —
Because they (the dreams) want to come. — Why ? — To pay
us out {pour nous embeter). — Why ? — So that we shall
wake up."

Bag (7) : " Where do dreams come from ? — At night,
from God. God sends them. — How ? — He makes the night
come and he whispers in our ears. — How is the dream made ?
— It is made with words. . . . — What is the dream made
of ? — It is made of letters." We asked Bag to tell us one
of his dreams : he had dreamed of robbers. " Where did
this dream come from ? — From God. — Why did God send
you this dream ? — To pay me out, because I wasn't good."
" What had you done to have such a dream ? — I'd been
naughty, I'd made Mother cry. I'd made her run round the
table." This last was not from the dream Bag told us,
but was true ; after behaving stupidly Bag had tried, in
order to escape his mother, to " run round the table " !

DREAMS loi

GiAMB (8|) : " Where do dreams come from ? — They
are when you've done something and you know of it lots of
times. — 'What does that mean ? — You've done something
and you dream of it every day." Giamb would thus seem
to have reached the second stage, but as we shall see, he
is between the two, the origin of the dream he regards
as both internal and external. " Where is the dream when
you are dreaming ? — When you've done something ? —
When you dream, where are you ? — In bed. — Where is
the dream ? — At home. — Where ? — In the house, where the
thing is you've done (!) — Where is the dream ? — In the
room. — Where ? — In the bed. — Where ? — All over, every-
where in the bed. — Where does the dream come from ? —
Where you've been for a walk. — When you dream of Miss
S. (the teacher) where does the dream come from ? —
From school. — What made the dream ? — Perhaps it was
in class, you did something, then you dream about it. — Why
do you dream of the boys ? (he had dreamed of his school-
fellows)— Because they did things they ought not to. —
Why did you dream of it ? — Because they did things they
ought not to. — What makes dreams ? — It's what you see
while you are dreaming. — What do you dream with ? —
With the eyes. — Where does the dream come from ? — From
the children who did the things. It's what the children did."
We try suggestion : " Does the dream come from the head
or from outside ? — From the head. — Why from the head ?
— Because you've done something you ought not to. — Who
told you you dream of things you ought not to have done ?
— Because sometimes you are afraid (fear is felt to be a
retribution)." A moment later we tried the following
suggestive question : " Who sends dreams ? — The boys
who made us dream."

It is clear from these examples that for the child the
dream is not usually an accidental happening but is
rather an emotional resultant. It may be that certain
parents are stupid enough to make use of their children's
dreams to make them believe in retribution for wrong-
doing but in the cases quoted above the child's belief in
the purposive character of dreams seems to be quite
spontaneous : Sci, for example, does not draw any moral
from the dream, but nevertheless regards it as directed
towards a definite end ; Giamb connects his dream with

102 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

faults he has not himself committed and sees in the fear
the dream provokes the proof of its moral character. From
this purposiveness to the idea that the dream is caused
by persons outside the dream is but a step. Giamb takes
the step although he has almost arrived at the second
stage.

But, in other respects, Giamb's answers bear a singular
resemblance to those of Mont and of Metr, quoted earlier.
The essence of Giamb's remarks, as of Mont's, is, in fact,
a realism of the image, analogous to nominal realism, and
such that the image is conceived as necessarily bound up
with the thing it represents. Indeed, although Giamb
says that the dream comes from " when you've done
something and you know of it," and although following
our suggestion he admits that the dream comes from the
head, he none the less regards the dream as taking place
in the room or at the very spot " where the thing is you've
done," that is to say at the place where the thing is which
the dream is about. Further, he suggests that the persons
the dream is about are the cause of the dream, because
they have done " things they ought not to." The dream,
according to Giamb, comes " from the children who did
the things."

In short, treating these answers merely as negative
indications and without ascribing any systematic theory
to the child the following conclusions may be drawn.
Whilst regarding the dream as false, that is to say as an
image displayed in front of us in order to deceive us, thx?
child, nevertheless, adheres to the suggestion that the image
is a part of the person it represents and is a material
emanation of the facts it has observed. Just as the word
participates in the object of which it is the name and is
situated both in it and close to us at the same time, so
the image participates in the object imagined and is
situated both in it and in the room at the same time.
The sign is confused with the thing signified. It need
not, however, be supposed that the child regards the
person of whom he dreams as the conscious and only

DREAMS 103

cause of the dream but simply that he has not yet the
capacity to regard the image of a person that he has
actually seen as something internal that has been pro-
duced by thought. The immediate source of this image
is regarded as in the person just as the immediate source
of names was held to be in the objects named (Chapter II),
and in this case all the more so since the emotional and
moral aspect of the dream makes the child regard the
image as pursuing him not by chance but in order to
punish him.

It is this emotional aspect which explains why it is
almost always persons and not things that children
regard as causing the images which form their dreams.
When the child says that the night or the moon have
sent the dreams he has not dreamed of the night or the
moon, but when he says that a certain person has sent the
dream it means he has dreamed of that person. Also it is
obviously easier to maintain the reaUst attitude towards
images when these are of persons than when they are of
things ; the image of a person is much more charged with
emotion than that of a thing and so is much more hkely
to be conceived as directly inspired by the person it
represents than the image of an object as inspired by the
object. The attitude of children towards pictures is, in
fact, well known : —

Dan, a child of 14, whom we shall quote presently,
remembers having beheved during his childhood " that
statues and pictures of people were not alive but could think
and see. One wasn't alone so long as there was a picture in
the room."

Del (6J) (see Language and Thought, p. 207) before a
statue : "Is it dead ? "

Dar (2) cried because a photograph had just fallen
from the wall, and said that the ladies had hurt themselves
falling.

In short, apart from the emotional aspect we have just
considered, the participation between the images and the
persons they represent must be regarded as of the same

104 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

type as that between names and the things named. Seen
in this hght, the behefs we have studied seem easy to
interpret. Our interpretation is, moreover, made more
acceptable by the fact that when they first dream all
children regard their dreams as real. It is principally
through the agency of its parents and its social environ-
ment that the child becomes undeceived. But for this
influence the participation between the persons seen in
the dream and the real persons would be much keener.

Is it possible, nevertheless, to find children who
systematically admit such participations and who thus
systematically beheve in their dreams, yet place them
on a plane other than that of reality ? According to
Sully this is so (see Studies of Childhood, pp. 103, 104).
We have only found a single case favouring this view
and a doubtful one at that since it is based only on
memories. It must, however, be mentioned, since it
might be of value if anyone were to have the good fortune
to find similar beliefs by direct observation.

Dan (14) knows nothing of the sociology of primitive
peoples and comes of a family entirely free from super-
stition. The bonds of friendship and confidence which
exist between us preclude the possiblity of any attempt
on his part to deceive us intentionally in relating the
memories of his childhood. Dreams he says were for him
" real." They were " like another world." " Every one
went to bed (in reality) about the same time and then either
one was carried off to another world or else everything
changed." Dan was quite aware that he remained in his
bed, " but all of myself was outside." (We shall find the
same expressions given by a child of 8, Fav, in the follow-
ing section.) The world of dreams was arranged in
countries and Dan maintained that he could find the
same places in one dream as in another. " / often had
the same dream, about cats. There was a wall, a little train
and lot of cats on the wall and all the cats chased me." This
dream of the cats used to frighten Dan, but to return to
the real world he had a device which he used in the dream
itself : " I would throw myself on the ground (in the dream)
and then I would wake up. I was still very frightened (once
awake). / had the idea that I had been eaten up by the cuts."

DREAMS 105

A point of particular interest is that Dan used these ideas
to explain the stories he was told and conversely he used
the stories to co-ordinate his world of dreams. Thus, like
nearly all the children we questioned on the subject, he
would explain how fairies, ogres, etc., must at one time
have existed since they are still spoken of in stories to-day.
But, according to Dan, this fairy world still survived in
the world of dreams. In particular, the voyage which
took one from one's bed to join the dream, " had some-
thing to do with fairy-tales." " The magic voyages " of
fairy-tales must once have been real, since they were still
possible in the dream.

As a child Dan had also, associated with the feelings of
being a stranger to one's self and of loss of personality
that so many children experience, the idea that everything
must happen of necessity, that everything was decided
beforehand, that one was not responsible and that punish-
ments ought not therefore to exist. But he attributed the
same qualities to the dream world ; everything happened
there of necessity, but without reference to the real
world. It was " hke a double hfe," but a life regulated
in advance and independent of the will of the dreamer.

Finally, what seems to prove that these statements
really correspond to the actual beliefs Dan held as a child
(and that they are not merely systematisations made by
him in retrospect at the age of 14) is that this behef in
the land of dreams disappeared all at once when he first
went to school and mixed with other boys. Indeed, he
remembers having wondered whether his school- fellows
also went to the land of dreams, and having decided it
could not be so, his own conviction suffered definitely.

It is impossible to say how much truth is contained in
these memories of Dan. But they seem to point to the
fact that, but for the adult social environment, children's
conceptions of dreams would show even stronger partici-
pation than that already analysed. But, whatever the
extent of these participations (which in the child can only
be arrived at with difficulty, owing to their emotional
colouring) the fact is established that during the first

io6 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

stage the images of the dream are regarded as being
external to mind and as emanating from external sources
either in the persons and the things dreamed of or in such
substances as the night, the light, etc.

§ 2. The Second Stage : the Dream arises in us
Ourselves but is External to Us. — The best proof of
the truth of the preceding interpretations is the existence
of the second stage. This stage is, in certain respects,
more interesting than the first, since it reveals the child's
realism in its most determined and developed form. The
children of this stage have, indeed, discovered or learned
that the dream comes from ourselves, or from thought,
or from the head, etc. But, since they cannot understand
how an image can be " external " at the moment of seeing
it they place it, as in the first stage, in the room beside
them.

It seems as if in a large number of cases the child comes
independently to the conclusion that he dreams with
thought or with the head. The contradictions of the
dream with reahty force him, in fact, gradually to dis-
tinguish the image from the thing it represents, and thus
to regard the image, if not as a mental object, at least as
an object detached from reality and connected with
speech, sight, thought, etc. It is the same process we
found with names, when the names are first regarded as
existing independently of the thing named.

The following examples are of intermediate cases be-
tween the first and second stages, in which may be dis-
cerned the first spontaneous, though groping efforts to
cast off the idea of an external origin for the dream.

Horn (5:3): " You know what it is to dream ? — Yes.
It's when you see people. — Where is the dream ? — In the
smoke {la fumee). — What smoke ? — The smoke that comes
from the bedclothes. — Where do the dreams come from ?
— From here (pointing to his stomach). — Then how is it
that they are in the bedclothes while you are dreaming ?
— Because you know it's like that." Horn adds that the
dream comes in front of the eyes, a few centimetres away.
He does not believe thought to be with the mouth but

DREAMS 107

situates thought in the thorax. Is the smoke with which
he associates the dream, therefore, the respiration ? Com-
parison of Horn's case with those of Ris (§ i) and Falq
(Chapter I, § 3) would suggest that this is so ; the dream,
in so far as it is thought, being held to consist in speaking,
in air and in the breath from respiration.

Dug (6|) : " What is a dream ? — You dream at night.
You are thinking of something (!) — Where does it come
from ? — / don't know. — What do you think ? — That we
make them ourselves (!) — Where is the dream while you
are dreaming ? — Outside. — Where ? — There (pointing to
the street, through the window). — Why outside ? — Be-
cause you've got up. — And then ? — It goes. — While you
are dreaming where is it ? — With us. — Where ? — In the
bed. — Where. — Near. — If I was there, should I see it ? —
No . . . Yes, because you'd be near the bed. — Where does
the dream come from ? — Nowhere (!) — What does it come
out of ? — Out of the bed. — How does it get there ? —
Because you're dreaming. — Where is the dream made ? —
In the bed. — How ? — From air {cp. Horn). — Where does
the air come from ? — From outside. — Why ? — Because the
window is open. — Why do you dream ? — Because yester-
day we went bathing and were frightened. — Is there some-
thing that sends the dream ? — Yes, the birds. — Why ? —
Because they like the air." Dug then told how he had
dreamed of soldiers. " Where did this dream come from ?
— From outside. — Where ? — From far away, over there
(pointing through the window). — Why ? — Because there's
a wind. — What sends the dreams ? — The air. — And then ?
— The birds. — And then ? — The pigeons. — And then ? —
That's all. — Why the pigeons ? — Because they're happy
when it's windy. — Do the pigeons send the dreams on
purpose ? — No. — Do they know they are sending them ?
— No. — Then why do they send them ? — Because of the
wind. — Does the pigeon make the dream ? — Yes. — How ?
By bringing the wind. — If there wasn't any wind, could we
dream ? — No, the dream wouldn't be able to come."

These curious cases closely recall the explanations of
the phenomenon of thought given by children at the end
of the first and beginning of the second stages : thought
is voice, that is to say is composed of air and smoke, and
it is both external and internal. (See Rou, etc., § i,
Chapter I, and Falq, § 3). It is interesting to notice that

io8 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Dug, like children when they first distinguish the name
from the thing and reahse it to be a mental object, declares
first of all that the dream is " nowhere," to fall back later
into the realism of the first stage.

The following two cases are also intermediate between
the first and second stages : —

Pig (9^) : " Where do dreams come from ? — When you
are asleep, you think someone is beside you. When yoti see
something in the day, you dream of it at night. — What is the
dream ? — Oh, anything. — Where does it come from ? — /
don't know. It comes by itself. — Where from ? — Nowhere.
Where is it made ? — In the room. — Where ? — When you
are lying down. — Where is it made, in the room or inside
you ? — In me . . . outside. — Which, do you think ? —
Outside. — Where does the dream come from, from the
room or from you ? — From me. — Where is it, outside or
in you ? — Beside me. — Where ? — In my room. — How far
away ? (He points to 30 cms. in front of him.) "

Dus (9) is a similar case. He Ukewise beheves that
the self is concerned in the making of the dream : " Where
do dreams come from ? — When you are ill." But the origin
of the dream is also external : " Where do they come
from ? — They come from outside us." Dreaming is " with
the mouth," but the dream is " in the bed. — Where ? In
the head or outside ? — Outside."

In short, the dream is external to the body and its
origin is both internal (the mouth) and external. This
is the counterpart of what we saw with the children who
claimed to think with the mouth whilst regarding thought
as identical with the external air. Pig has moved a big
step beyond the first stage in admitting that we dream
of things we have seen and thus ourselves play a part in
making the dream, but he is still far from the idea that
the dream comes from within ourselves, that it has, in
fact, an internal origin.

The next cases are definitely examples of the second
stage, where the dream comes from us but is external
whilst we are dreaming.

ScHi (6) is a very intelligent small boy who answered
the questions with a Uvely interest. His answers are,

DREAMS 109

therefore, especially valuable : " Do you sometimes have
dreams ? What is a dream ? — You think (l) of something
during the night. — What do you dream with ? — With the
soul {avec I' ante), with thought. — Where does the dream
come from ? — During the night. It's the night that shows
us the dream. — What does that mean ? Where is the
dream whilst you're dreaming ? — It is in the — (he was
about to say " head "), it is between the night and the head{\)
— While you are dreaming, are your eyes open or shut ? —
Shut. — Then where is the dream ? — It's when you see black
that the dream comes. — Where is it ? — While you are not
asleep it's in the head. While you are asleep it comes out{\)
When it's night, it's night, but while you're asleep it isn't
night any more. — When the dream comes, where is it ? — In
front of the eyes and it goes against the wall. — Could your
father see it ? — No. — Only you ? — Yes, because it's me
that's asleep."

Schi's case gives the key to all the phenomena of the
second stage. Schi knows that the dream is made of
" thought," and that it is ourselves who make the dream.
But he has not yet realised that the dream is internal in
relation to the body. In order to see it, even with the
eyes shut, it must be " between the night and us." Schi
is thus led to admit that the dream " comes out " as
soon as one is asleep. We must take care not to attribute
to Schi a theory as to the nature of this process : Schi
limits himself to stating his immediate impression accord-
ing to which only external objects can be seen. His reaUsm
prevents him making any distinction between " seeming
external " and " being external." If he regarded the
dream as only " seeming external " he would not have
had to situate it " against the wall," but would have
placed it either in the head or in the objects of which he
dreamed (at school, on the lake, etc.). Schi reaUses, how-
ever, that he alone can see his dream. It will be re-
membered that Schi, too, held a similar view concerning
thought : " when you have been told something, it comes
into your mind, then it goes out and then it comes back
again." (Chapter I, § i).

The following case was brought to our notice on account

y

no CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

of a drawing that had been made spontaneously and
previous to any examination on our part : —

Fav (8) belongs to a class whose teacher follows the
excellent practice of giving each child an " observation
notebook," in which the child notes down each day, with
or without the help of drawings, an event he has person-
ally observed outside school. One morning Fav noted
down, as always, spontaneously : "I dreamt that the
devil wanted to boil me," and he accompanied the obser-
vation with a drawing, of which we give a reproduction :
on the left Fav is seen in bed, in the centre is the devil,
and on the right Fav stands, in his nightshirt, in front of
the devil who is about to boil him. Our attention was
called to this drawing and we sought out Fav. His draw-
ing illustrates very clearly the meaning of child realism :
the dream is beside the bed, before the eyes of the dreamer
who watches it. Fav, moreover, is in his nightshirt in
the dream, as if the devil had pulled him out of bed.

The following are the observations we made : Concern-
ing the origin of dreams, Fav has passed the beliefs of
the first stage. Like Schi he knows that the dream comes
from thought : " What is a dream ? — It is a thought. —
Where does it come from ? — When you see something and
then you think of it. — Do we make the dream ourselves ? —
Yes. — Does it come from outside ? — No." Fav also knows
that we think " with the brain, with our intelligence."
Further, Fav, like Schi and all the children of this stage,
knows that he alone can see his dream ; neither we nor
anyone else could have seen the dream of the devil in
Fav's room. But what he has not understood is the
internal nature of the dream : " Whilst you are dreaming,
where is the dream ?— /« front of the eyes. — Where ? —
When you are in bed, in front of your eyes. — Where, quite
near ? — No in the room." We pointed to Fav's portrait
of himself which we have marked II, " What is that ? —
That's me. — Which is most real of you, this (I) or that
(II) ? — In the dream (pointing to II). — Is this one any-
thing (II) ? — Yes, it's me. It was specially my eyes which
stayed there (pointing to I), to see (!) — How were your eyes
there ? — I was there altogether, but specially my eyes. —
And the rest of you ? — It was there too (in the bed). — How
could that be ? — There was two of me. I was in my bed
and I was looking on all the time. — With the eyes open
or shut ? — Shut, because I was asleep." A moment later

DREAMS

III

it seemed as if Fav had understood the internal nature of
the dream : " When you are asleep, is the dream in you
or are you in the dream ? — The dream is in us, because it's
we who see the dream. — Is it inside the head or outside ?
— In the head. — Just now you said outside, what does
that mean ? — You can't see the dream on the eyes. — Where
is the dream ? — In front of the eyes. — Is there really any-
thing in front of the eyes ? — Yes. — What ? — The dream."
Fav thus realises there is something internal about the

^

-M

m

dream, he knows the dream's appearance of externality
to be illusion (" you can't see the dream on the eyes "),
and yet he admits that for the illusion to be there, there
must really be something in front of him : "Were you
really there (pointing to II) ? — Yes, I was there twice over
(I and II). — If I had been there, should I have seen you
(II) ? — No. — What do you mean by ' I was there twice
over ' ? — When I was in bed I was really there, and then
when I was in my dream I was with the devil, and I was
really there as well."

These answers point to the following conclusions. Fav
does not know how to distinguish the dream's appear-
ance of externality from externality itself. He agrees
that there must be something in the head since "it's we
who see the dream." This marks a great advance on the

112 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

first stage. He even agrees that to see the dream as
external is to suffer an illusion : " You can't see the
dream on the eyes," that is to say that in dreaming you
see something external and not internal. But for Fav
this illusion is certainly not because we deceive ourselves,
or think we se^ something outside which is, in fact, inside
us. For him the illusion consists in our being deceived
by material images, which exist objectively in front of
us, but which we take not for images but for persons. He
does not doubt the existence of these external images.
We, as adults, say that there is false perception : he says
there is a real perception of something deceptive. The
dream is thus for Fav like an immaterial projection, like
a shadow, or an image in a mirror. Otherwise it would
be impossible to explain his spontaneous reflection," it
was specially my eyes which stayed there (I) to see." In
short, Fav seems to waver between contradictory state-
ments, though perhaps for him they do not appear so.
We have only to recall that he regards thought as a
material substance, to understand the paradox in his
remarks : on the one hand, we project outside something
which arises in our heaH, and on the other, what we
project out has a material existence in the room.

These facts throw light on the nature of the partici-
pations between the images of the dream and the persons
they represent, such as we found, existing in the first
stage. Fav, indeed, certainly seems to admit that the
image II contains something of himself. This explains
why he holds that it was his eyes " especially " which
stayed in his bed {cp. Dan's expression in § i, " but all of
myself was outside " ; cp. also Metr's expression in the
same section, " it's I that am in the dream, it isn't in my
head "). It goes without saying that this remark of Fav's
is only an awkward form of expression and that he does not
hold that behef in a dual self which ethnologists hke to attri-
bute to primitive peoples (only do the primitives reason like
Fav or like the ethnologists ?). But how exactly does the
difficulty arise ? Simply because the image II is regarded

DREAMS 113

as external to the subject I. The participation of II and
I thus comes from Fav's reahsm. For us there is no parti-
cipation between the image and the person represented,
since the image is nothing but an internal representation,
but for a realist mind which regards the image as in the
room, the image retains something of the person. It is
the exact counterpart of what we saw with names, which,
from the fact that they are not conceived as internal and
mental objects, participate in the thing named.

In order to show that these interpretations are not
fantastic, we quote some further cases, not so rich as
those of Schi and Fav but equally clear on the essential
question of the extemaUty of the dream.

Mos (11 ; 6) describes the dream as " something you
think when you are asleep and, that you see. — Where does it
come from ? — It is something you've thought during the day.
Where is the dream ? — In front of you. — Can one see it ? —
Oh, no I — Why not ? — It's invisible (this statement is
very convincing and shows that Mos is not speaking of
images one thmks one sees outside, but of something
invisible which is projected byjthought and which pro-
duces the images outside). — Is it in front of the eyes ? —
No. — Where ? — A little further away. — Where ? — It is
things which pass by and which you don't see."

MiTH (7^) : " You know what it is to dream ? — Yes.' —
What do we dream with ? — With the eyes. — Where does
it come from ? — The heart ? — Where is the dream while
you are dreaming ? — In the dream, in the mind {dans
notre conscience). — Is it reaUy and truly there ? — No. —
Where is it ? — OtUside. — Where ? — In the room."

Card (9^) : The dream is " when you think the house is
on fire, when you think you are going to be burned. — Is the
dream true ? — No, because you're asleep. — What is it ? —
It's fire. It's when you think of something. — Where does
the dream come from ? — The head. — What do you dream
with ? — When you think. — What with ? — The intelligence. —
Where is the dream ? — In the bed. — Is it inside us or in
front of us ? — In the room. — Where ? — Quite near. — Have
you just found that out ? — No, I knew it already."

Gren (13 ; 6, backward) : " Where does the dream
come from ? — When you think." It comes " from us "

H

114 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

(Gren points to his forehead). " Where is the dream ? —
Here (pointing to 30 cms. in front of his eyes)."

Kenn (7^) : The dream is when "you make up things."
It comes from " the mouth. — Are your eyes open or shut
when you dream ? — Shut. — Should I see the dream if
I were there ? — No. You don't see it because it isn't near
you. — Why don't you see it ? — Because it isn't near us. —
Where is it ? — Not near us. — Where is it ? — Further away. —
Where do you think ? . . . — It comes towards us." " Where
do they come from ? — The mouth. — When you dream of
school, where is the dream ? — At school, because it's as if
you were at school. — Is the dream really at school or is it
only as if it were at school ? — It is at school. — Really and
truly ? — No. — Is it at school or in your mouth ? — In my
mouth. — You said it was far away. Is that true or not
true ? — It's far away."

ZiMM (8 ; i) contrary to Kenn does not beheve the
dream to be at school but places it in front of his eyes.
When he dreams of school, Zimm says : " / think I'm
there. — When you dream, is the dream at school or inside
you ? — In my room ? "

Bar (7) is a similar case. Dreams " come from us. —
When you dream you are at school, where is the dream ?
— In front of me. — Outside you ? — Yes. — In the room ? —
In front of me."

The above examples show how httle the discovery that
the dream is due to thought modifies the phenomena of
locahsation observed in the first stage. Thus although
Kenn may say he dreams with the mouth, he gives, as
the proof that another person could not see his dream,
the fact that the dream is situated at the place it is about.
Our counter-suggestions made no difference. Naturally,
Kenn does not suppose that the dream actually takes
the dreamer " to school " ; he simply beUeves that the
image of the school, the image seen in the dream, is " at
school," just as children of his age think that, when they
speak, the name of the sun is " in the sun." However,
for the majority of children in the second stage the dream
is close to them, usually 30 cms. in front of their eyes.

But before regarding these interpretations as certain,
we must, according to our usual criterion, first question

DREAMS 115

more advanced children who are on the point of reaching
the conect answer, to see if they were really the victims
of the illusions we seemed to find among the youngest.
The following three cases are of this type : —

Drap (15, but rather backward) stated spontaneously
when answering the question on thought : " Can one see
thought ? — Yes, in dreaming. — Why ? — You dream some-
thing and you see it in front of you." We then continued
along the line suggested by Drap : " What do you dream
with ? — With the memory. — Where is the dream ? — Not
in any place. — Where is it, in your head or in front of you ?
— In front. You can see it, hut you can't touch it. — Why
in front ? — Because if it was inside you wouldn't see it
{op. the remark of Barb in the first stage)."

Drap seems more advanced than the preceding cases in
saying the dream is " not in any place." But he simply
means by this that it is immaterial. The context shows
clearly that he still beheves the dream to be in front of
him. The proof lies in what follows : —

We tried to make Drap understand the internal nature
of the dream : " Now you see me, and you remember that
you saw me last year. You remember my face ? — Yes.
— Where is what you remember ? — In front of my eyes.
— Why ? — Because you can't see inside the head. It is as
if (!) it was in front of me." After having understood the
difference between being and seeming (" as if "), Drap
finally agrees that the image is in the head. He says then
that he understands for the first time that the dream is
in the head.

His surprise at the explanation clearly shows that
previously he had not been able to distinguish " being ''
from " seeming."

Pug (7:2): The dream is " when you see things that
aren't true. — Who told you that ? — No one. — Where do
dreams come from ? — / don't know. — From the head or
from outside ? — From the head. — Where is the dream ? —
In front of you. — Where ? — Quite near (pointing to 30
cms. from his eyes). — Is it really there or does it seem to
be there ? — / don't know. — Should I see it if I were there ?
— No, because you wouldn't he asleep. — And could your

ii6 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

mother see it ? — No. — But then you say it is outside ? — No,
it is not outside. — Where is it ? — Nowhere. — Why ? — It isnt
anything. — Is it outside or in the head ? — In the head. —
Then it isn't in front of you. — Yes, it is in front of me all
the same (!) " — " Is the dxeam inside your head? — Yes. —
Then it isn't in front of you ? — Yes, it is everywhere."

This case shows how Uttle effect suggestion has on a
child at this stage. Pug is wiUing to admit that the dream
is in the head, but he continues to beUeve it is outside
and everywhere. His case is precisely parallel with that
of Roc (Chapter II, § 2) concerning names : Roc is wiUing
to admit that names are in the head, but he none the less
believes them to be present in the room.

Grand (8) : " You know what it is to dream ? — Once
I saw a man who frightened me in the day and I dreamed
of it at night. — Where does a dream come from ? Where
is it made ? — In the head. — Where is the dream while you
are dreaming ? — . . . — In the head or outside ? — It seems (!)
as if it's outside." Grand thus seems to regard the
external nature of the dream as an illusion. But we then
asked : " Where is the dream ? — Neither outside nor inside.
— Where then ? — In the room. — Where ? — All round me.
— Far or quite near ? — Quite near, when my brother dreams
he shivers."

Since the dream made Grand's brother shiver it must
be something, immaterial perhaps, but external. The
rest of the examination, as we shall see, placed Grand in
the third stage, by a sudden break with what had gone
before.

These last cases in which the child reasons and seeks,
evidently show that it is not simply through lack of
verbal capacity that children of the second stage say
the dream is in the room. They clearly distinguish
" being " from " seeming." They doubt the external
nature of the dream yet without it they can find no ex-
planation of how one can " see something " : " you can't
see what is inside the head I "

In short, the realism of the second stage is much subtler
than that of the first. It is a more intellectual, less

DREAMS 117

obvious realism. But, as such, it confirms our inter-
pretations of the phenomena of the first stage. In fact,
if the essential discovery that the dream is due to the
thinking subject be suppressed from the statements of
the second stage, there remain the following : (i) that
the dream is external ; (2) that in so far as the image of
a person is not a subjective representation on the part
of the sleeper, it must be bound up with that person
through participation. This is just what we saw and
what we found traces of right through the second stage.

§ 3. The Third Stage : the Dream is Internal
AND OF Internal Origin. — There are two problems still
to be discussed : the manner in which images come
increasingly to be regarded as internal and the child's
views on the connection between thought and dreams.

Some intermediate cases between the second and third
stages must first be considered.

Grand (8) is especially interesting, for after supporting
the external nature of the dream on grounds which we
have already seen, he arrives spontaneously at the follow-
ing idea : " When I make my eyes turn (by rubbing them),
/ see a sort of head inside them (phosphene). — Is the dream
inside or outside ? — / think it's neither beside me nor in
my room. — Where is it ? — In my eyes."

Pasq (yh) '. " Where is the dream when you are dream-
ing, in the room or in you ? — In me. — Did you make it
or does it come from outside ? — / made it. — What do you
dream with ? — The eyes. — When you dream, where is the
dream ? — In the eyes. — Is it in the eye or behind the eye ?
— In the eye."

Falq (7:3): " Where do dreams come from ? — In the
eyes. — Where is the dream ? — In the eyes. — Show me
where ? — Behind there (pointing to the eye).— Is a dream
the same as a thought ? — No, it is something. — What ? —
A story. — If one could see behind the eyes, would one
see anything ? — No, it's a little skin. — What is on this
skin ? — Little things, little pictures."

It is interesting to note that Grand and Falq are amongst
those children who beheve thought to be " a voice in the
head." It wiU be remembered that children at first be-

ii8 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Heve they think with the mouth and identify thought
with words and regard names as bound up with the
things themselves. Then, when they realise that thought
is internal, they first regard it as a " voice " situated at
the back of the mouth, in the head. Exactly the same
hapjjens to their conceptions of the dream. The dream
is first an external picture, produced by things, then by
the head. Later, when the child begins to reaUse the
internal nature of the dream, he regards it as a picture
— according to Falq, as a " story," imprinted in the eye
or behind the eye — in short, what the eye can " see "
internally, just as the ear " hears " the internal voice of
thought.

In the case of dreams as in that of speech, the thought
is thus still confused with physical matter. Even the
most advanced children, that is to say cases definitely
belonging to the third stage, who regard the dream simply
as thought and as internal thought, still frequently let
out remarks betraying the material nature of this thought.

Tann (8) : " Where do dreams come from ? — When you
shut the eyes ; instead of it's being night, you see things. —
Where are they ? — Nowhere. They aren't real. They're
in the eyes. — Do dreams come from within you or from
outside ? — From outside. When you go for a walk and
you see something, it makes a mark on the forehead in little
drops of blood. — What happens when you are asleep ? —
You see it. — Is the dream inside the head or outside ? —
It comes from outside, and when you dream of it, it comes
from the head. — Where are the images when you are
dreaming ? — From inside the brain they come into the eyes.
— Is there anything in front of the eyes ? — No."

Step (7 J) : The dream is " in my head. — In your head
or in front of your eyes ? — In front of my eyes. No, it is in
my head." But the dream is " when you talk to yourself
quite alone and then you sleep. — Where does the dream
come from ? — When you speak alone."

Tann is evidently full of adult ideas, but the way in
which he has absorbed them is none the less interesting.

The following cases are more advanced and have given
up trjdng to materialise thought and internal images.

DREAMS 119

They must, therefore, be placed in the third stage that
we distinguished concerning thought. It may be noted
also that these children are about the age of 10 or 11,
which confirms the age we found for this stage.

Ross (9 ; 9) : The dream is " when you think of some-
thing.— Where is the dream ? Is it in front of you ? —
In my head. — As if there were pictures in your head ?
How does that happen ? — No, you see a picture of what
you've done earlier."

Vise (11 ; i) : You dream " with the head," and the
dream is " in the head. — It isn't in front ? — It's as if (!)
you qould see. — Is there anything in front of you ? —
Nothing. — What is there in your head ? — Thoughts — Do
the eyes see anything in the head ? — No."

BoucH (11 ; 10) : " If you dream that you are dressed,
you see a picture. Where is it 7— I'm dressed like other
people, then it (the picture) is in my head, hut you'd think (!)
it was in front of you."

Cell (10 ; 7) also says : "It seems as if I see it (the
house) in front of me, hut it's in my head."

These examples show how differently these children
react, when faced by the same or even more suggestive
questions, from the children of the earlier stages. Such
expressions as " you think that," " it seems as if," " it's
as if," to describe the seemingly external nature of the
dream, are new and very characteristic of this stage.

§ 4. Conclusions. — It remains to disentangle the
relations existing between the results just analysed, and
the results of our study of names and of the notion of
thought. The relationship is very close and there is a
remarkable parallelism between the two groups of pheno-
mena. Children's ideas on thought and on words seem
to be characterised by three varieties of realism — or, if
it be preferred, three " adualisms." All three are also
present in the case of dreams and gradually disappear in
the same order as with names.

Firstly, children confuse the sign with the thing signified,
or the mental object and the thing it represents. Con-
cerning thought in general, the idea and the name of the
sun, for example, are regarded as a part of the sun and

120 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

as having their origin in the sun. To touch the name
of the sun would be to touch the sun itself. With
dreams we found the case very similar ; the image
dreamed of is felt to come from the thing or person the
image represents. The dream of a man who has been
run over comes from the man himself, etc. Further, when
the dream is of school the dream is "at school," just as
when the sun is thought of, the word or name thought
are " in the sun." The confusion is thus between the
dream and the thing dreamed of.

In both cases, this realism gives rise to feelings of
participation. The name of the sun appears to the child
to imply the heat, the colour, the shape of the sun. By
direct participation the name passes to and fro like a
shuttlecock between the sun and us. In Uke manner the
dream of a man who has been run over seems to come
from the man himself and above all it comes charged with
emotion, " to pay us out, ' or " because we've done some-
thing we ought not to have done," etc.

But the confusion between sign and thing signified
disappears earlier in the case of the dream than in the
case of names and thoughts, for the simple reason that
the dream is deceptive, which forces the sign to cut itself
adrift from the things it represents. It is, moreover,
this deceptive and frightening character of dreams
which explains why the participations have such a much
stronger affective tone in the case of dreams than in that
of names.

The second confusion is between internal and external.
In the most primitive stage, words are situated in things,
then everywhere and particularly in the surrounding air,
then in the mouth alone and finally in the head. Dreams
follow a precisely similar course : first, they are in the
things (but not for long, owing to the circumstances
referred to above), then they are situated in the room,
even when their origin is known to be the head (just as
words are situated in the surrounding air, even when
their source is the mouth) ; finally, dreams are described

DREAMS 121

as in the eyes and ultimately as in the head and in thought
itself.

In the case of thought, this confusion between internal
and external gives rise, in the primitive stages, to para-
doxical behefs, such as that according to which thought
is a whisper situated at the same time in the head and
outside. Children's ideas on dreams entirely confirm this
interpretation ; for certain of them the dream is a voice
or air that is both external and internal.

Finally, the third variety of realism gives rise to a con-
fusion between thought and matter. Thought is, for
those children who have set themselves the question, a
whisper, if they suppose thought to be with the voice.
It can also be a smoke, since sometimes respiration is
confused with voice. The dream, for such children as
have considered the question, is equally of air or of smoke.
For the youngest who have not yet reaUsed the subjective
origin of dreams (first stage) it is simply " of night," or
" of Ught."

In studying the child's conceptions of names we arrived
at the conclusion that the confusion between sign and
thing signified was the first to disappear (about the age
of 7-8). This disappearance leads to the distinction be-
tween internal and external (about 9-10) and finally from
this distinction arises the idea that thought is something
other than a material substance. The process is yet
clearer as regards conceptions of the dream. The con-
fusion between the image and the corresponding object
disappears very early (5-6). As it disappears the dream
is no longer situated in things, and the distinction between
internal and external is thus already suggested and
becomes complete at about the age of 9-10 (beginning of
third stage). Finally, it is not till about 11 that this
distinction between internal and external leads the child
definitely to understand that the dream is not a material
image, but simply a thought.

There is thus a complete parallelism between the child's
conceptions of names and of thought and its conceptions

122 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

concerning dreams. But, it goes without saying, that
during the primitive stages, the children themselves see
no analogy nor connection between the dream and the
word. Neither images nor names are regarded as mental
objects and they can thus have no relationship in the
child's eyes. The similarity of the phenomena observed in
the two cases, and of the steps in the evolution of these
phenomena is thus a guarantee of the worth of our experi-
ments and their interpretation. These certainly still need
confirming by the repetition of the experiments in different
countries in order that the part played by adult influences
may be more definitely separated from the spontaneous
and constant conviction of the child. But such com-
parisons as we have been able to make from amongst
our material at Geneva, and from the answers collected
by Mile Ferret at Neufch^tel and in the Bernese Jura,
and those obtained at Madrid and at Santander by Mile
Rodrigo lead us to believe that the constancy and spon-
taneity with which we have credited the child preponder-
ates over the effect of adult influence.

CHAPTER IV

REALISM AND THE ORIGIN OF THE
IDEA OF PARTICIPATION

The aim of this chapter is to trace the consequences of
the realism analysed in the preceding chapters. It is first,
however, necessary to state definitely the real significance
of our researches on the notion of thought, nominal realism
and dreams ; since otherwise the interpretation of our
material may give rise to the gravest misconceptions. The
impression may have been formed that we endow children,
if not with actual theories, at any rate with clear and
spontaneously formulated ideas, as to the nature of thought
and of names and dreams. But nothing has been further
from our intention. We readily agree that children have
never or hardly ever reflected on the matters on which
they were questioned. The experiments aimed, therefore,
not at examining ideas the children had already thought
out, but at seeing how their ideas are formed in response
to certain questions and principally in what direction
their spontaneous attitude of mind tends to lead them.

In such circumstances the results can only be negative
and not positive. That is to say the explanation a child
gives in answer to one of our questions must not be taken
as an example of " a child's ideas," but serves simply to
show that the child did not seek the solution in the same
direction as we should have, but presupposed certain
implicit postulates different from those we should suppose.

It is these presuppositions alone that interest us here
and we shall henceforth therefore take no account of the
detail of the preceding results (since this detail is not

123

124 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

necessarily to be accepted at its face value) and retain
simply the following conclusion. The child is a realist,
since he supposes thought to be inseparable from its object,
names from the things named, and dreams to be external.
His realism consists in a spontaneous and immediate
tendency to confuse the sign and the thing signified,
internal and external, and the psychical and the physical.

The results of this realism are twofold. Firstly, the
limits the child draws between the self and the external
world are much less rigid than our own ; secondly, the
realism is further extended by " participations " and
spontaneous ideas of a magical nature.

This is the subject of the following sections.

§ I. Realism and the Consciousness of Self. —
The problem of the child's consciousness of self is ex-
tremely complex and it is not easy to treat it from a
general standpoint. To arrive at a synthesis it would be
necessary to undertake inquiries similar to those we have
just concluded on thought, names and dreams, for all the
contents of a child's consciousness. The problem must,
however, be faced since the questions of participation and
of magical causality are directly dependent on it.

We shall follow a method of regression, and limit our-
selves to determining the curve of transformation of the
processes studied in the preceding chapters and tracing it
back to where we may conjecture what were the original
stages. The method, though dangerous, seems the only
one possible.

Two conclusions may be drawn from the preceding
analyses. The first is that the child is no less conscious of
the content of his thought than we are of ours. He has
noted the existence of thoughts, of names and of dreams,
and a quantity of more or less subtle particularities. One
child stated that we dream of what interests us, another
that when we think of things, it is because " we want to
have them," another that he dreamed of his aunt because
he was so glad to see her again. Mostly children think
they dream because they have been frightened by some-

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 125

thing, etc. Further, there is present in the chOd a whole
extremely deUcate psychology, often very shrewd and
pointing in every case to a keen appreciation of its affective
life. In a preceding work {Judgment and Reason Chapter IV,
§ i) we maintained that the child's efforts at introspection
are extremely crude, but this does not in the least contradict
the present contention. It is possible to feel acutely the
results of a mental process (logical reasoning or affective
reasoning) without knowing how such a result came about.
This is precisely the case with the child and is what is
meatit when the child's " intuition " is spoken of ; a true
perception of the contents of consciousness but no know-
ledge of how these contents were acquired, such is the
paradox of this " intuition."

This paradox is closely related to the following facts.
The child may be aware of the same contents of thought
as ourselves but he locates them elsewhere. He situates
in the world or in others what' we seat within ourselves,
and he situates in himself what we place in others. In this
problem of the seat of the contents of mind lies the whole
problem of the child's consciousness of self, and it is through
not stating it clearly that what is in fact exceedingly
complex is made to appear simple. It is indeed possible
to suppose a mind extremely sensitive to the least stirrings
of the affective hfe, a keen observer of the niceties of
language, customs and conduct in general, yet hardly
conscious of his own self, since he systematically treats
each of his thoughts as objective and every feeUng as
common to all. The consciousness of self arises in fact
from the dissociation of reahty as conceived by the
primitive mind and not from the association of particular
contents. That the child shows a keen interest in himself,
a logical, and no doubt a moral, egocentricity, does not
prove that he is conscious of his self, but suggests, on the
contrary, that he confuses his self with the universe, in
other words that he is unconscious of his self. This is
what we shall attempt to prove.

In the preceding chapters we dealt only with the in-

126 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

struments of thought (percepts, images, words, etc.) and
not with actual conceptions nor above all with the affective
life. The child is almost as well aware of these instruments
as we are but he gives them an entirely different setting.
For us» an idea or a word is in the mind and the thing it
represents is in the world of sense perception. Also words
and certain ideas are in the mind of everybody, whilst other
ideas are peculiar to one's own thought. For the child,
thoughts, images and words, though distinguished to a
certain degree from things, are none the less situated in
the things. The continuous steps of this evolution may
be assigned to four phases : (i) a phase of absolute realism,
during which no attempt is made to distinguish the in-
struments of thought and where objects alone appear to
exist ; (2) a phase of immediate realism, during which the
instruments of thought are distinguished from the things
but are situated in the things ; (3) a phase of mediate
realism, during which the instruments of thought are still
regarded as a kind of things and are situated both in the
body and in the surrounding air ; and finally (4), a phase
of subjectivism or relativism, during which the instruments
of thought are situated within ourselves. In this sense
then, the child begins by confusing his self — or his thought
— with the world, and then comes to distinguish the two
terms one from each other.

It seems that we might extend this law even to the
contents of the conceptions, including the simplest per-
ceptions. During the primitive stage, the child feels every
conception to be absolute, as if the mind and the thing
were one, and only gradually comes to regard the con-
ception as relative to a given point of view. Thus in a
new sense, the child begins by confusing his self and the
world — that is to say in this particular case, his subjective
point of view and the external data — and only later dis-
tinguishes his own personal point of view from other
possible points of view. In fact the child always begins
by regarding his own point of view as absolute. We shall
see numerous examples later : the child thinks the sun

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 127

follows him, that the clouds follow him, that things are
always as he actually sees them and independent of per-
spective, distance, etc. ... In so far as he ignores that
his own point of view is subjective he believes himself the
centre of the world, whence follow a whole group of
finalistic, animistic and quasi-magical conceptions, ex-
amples of which occur on every page. These conceptions
alone point to the child's ignorance of the fact of sub-
jectivity.

But to be aware of the subjectivity of one's own point
of view is relatively an insignificant element in the con-
sciousness of self. This is essentially a feeling of the
personal quality of one's desires, incUnations, affections,
etc. Yet in relation to these does the child feel its first
experiences of pleasure and pain, its first desires, as
personal or as common to all ? The probabihty is that the
same law holds good here and that the child starts by being
convinced for the simple reason that it has never occurred
to it to doubt that everything it feels exists by itself,
objectively. It is by a series of disillusions and through
being contradicted by others that it comes to reahse the
subjectivity of feehng. Here again the self results from
the dissociation of the primitive consciousness ; the
primitive consciousness or unconsciousness that a certain
state is either pleasurable or painful is directly projected
into the surrounding world of reality, first through absolute
realism and then through immediate reahsm, and it is not
until this reahty becomes broken up that the feeling
arises of a given object and a subjective emotion which
gives it its personal value.

In short, to make a broad conjecture and without going
into any detail owing to lack of direct evidence, it seems
that in the primitive stage the whole content of the infant's
consciousness is projected into reality (both into things
and into others), which amoupts to a complete absence
of the consciousness of self. Three groups of observations
point in this direction.

Firstly, it is not possible to separate the conceptual

128 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

from the affective elements. However primitive a feeling
may be, it is accompanied by the consciousness of an
object or it itself creates an object. But, it has already
been asserted as a result of the phenomena observed in
the preceding chapters, that in the primitive state every
conception is reaUstic.

Secondly, the work of Baldwin and stiU more that of
Pierre Janet has made it clear that imitation is due to a
sort of confusion between the self and others. In other
words, the sound a child hears stimulates him to make the
necessary movement to continue it, without the child
seeing any difference between the sound that is independent
of him and the sound he has produced. The same thing
constantly happens to us in cases of involuntary imitation
when we identify ourselves with what we are imitating
without realising how much belonged originally to the
thing we are imitating and how much we have ourselves
endowed it with. We discussed in Chapter I, j§ 3)
the case of children who think they have themselves
discovered what they have as a matter of fact been taught
by others. Inversely, children always believe that things
which they do not know and have never known, they have
merely " forgotten." All that a child knows appears to it
to be its own discovery and what it does not know it
regards as forgotten. It would seem as if these phenomena
were due to hypertrophy of the sentiment of self-esteem ;
as a matter of fact they are simply signs of the absence of
any clear distinction between external and internal.
Imitation is impossible without projection, and this being
so, the reciprocal must also be true : the aims and desires
of the self must be attributed to others just as much as
the actions of others are attributed to the self.

Finally and most important, we know that an infant
does not spontaneously locahse its organic sensations. A
pain in the foot does not immediately draw its attention
to the foot, etc. It is rather a wandering pain which is
not localised and which every one is thought to share.
Even when localised the infant no doubt for a long time

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 129

still regards it as common to all ; it cannot spontaneously
realise that it alone is able to feel the pain. In short,
for the primitive consciousness and for us the relation
between the body viewed from outside and the body felt
from inside is entirely different : what we speak of as
internal and what we speak of as external are for a long
time equally regarded as common to aU.

Unfortunately, it is impossible to control these hj^-
theses by a direct analysis. But if we use the results
obtained from between the limits of 4 and 12 years of age
as a basis of inference in respect of ages below these limits
it seems to show that consciousness of the internal nature
of any state does not result from a direct intuition but
from an intellectual construction, and this construction
is only p>ossible by a dissociation of the contents of the
primitive consciousness.

Moreover, though the analysis of the primitive con-
sciousness is impossible without hypothesis, the dissociation
just mentioned can be more directly observed. One of
Edmund Gosse's memories of childhood is a valuable case
in point. As the result of teUing a lie which was neither
discovered nor punished, Edmund Gosse came to realise
that his father did not know everything, and it was this
knowledge that certain things were known to him alone
which seems to have strengthened in him the consciousness
of self.

" In the first place, the theory that my Father was om-
niscient or infallible was now dead and buried. He probably
knew very little ; in this case he had not known a fact of
such importance that if you did not know that, it could
hardly matter what you knew. . . . But of all the thoughts
which rushed upon my savage and undeveloped little brain
at this crisis, the most curious was that I had found a com-
panion and a confidant in myself. There was a secret in
this world and it belonged to me and to a somebody who
lived in the same body with me. There were two of us and
we could talk to one another. It is difficult to define im-
pressions so rudimentary, but it is certain that it was in this
dual form that the sense of my individuality now suddenly

130 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

descended upon me and it is equally certain that it was a
great solace to me to find a sympathiser in my own breast."

The quotation is of striking interest. So long as the
child believed in his father's omniscience, his own self was
non-existent, in the sense that his thoughts and actions
seemed to him common to all, or at any rate known to his
parents to the smallest detail. The moment he realised
that his parents did not know all, he straightway dis-
covered the existence of his subjective self. Certainly the
discovery was made late and only concerns the higher
plane of personality. But it shows clearly how the con-
sciousness of self results from a dissociation of reality and
is not a primitive intuition, and shows also to what extent
this dissociation is due to social factors, that is to say to
a distinction the child makes between his own point of
view and that of others.

In deahng with the relations between the body viewed
as external, and felt as internal, it may be of interest to
consider again the child's use of the first person. It is
well known that children speak of themselves in the third
person before they use the pronoun " I." The idiot
described by H. Wallon ^ when receiving correction said,
" See what Fernand's getting " (" Femand " being himself).
So too a little girl observed by the author said at the age
of 2 ; 9 : " T'es une 'moiselle, 'spas, moi ? " — meaning " I
am a girl, aren't I ? " but literally " you are a girl aren't
you, me ? " Baldwin and many others regard this as
evidence of a projective stage : the child sees itself as
outside its thought, as " projected " in a mirror in front
of its own eyes and without experiencing any feeUng of
subjectivity. This interpretation has been much disputed.
Rasmussen sees in it merely the child's imitation of those
it knows, who obviously use the child's name and not the
pronoun "I." M. Delacroix, in his admirable book, Le
Langage et la pensee, regards the " I " merely as an
instrument of grammar.

But it seems that behind the grammatical question
there is also a question of the logic of relations. As late
as the ages of 8 and g, a child will say "I've a brother,

' Journal de Psychologte, Vol. VIII (1911), p. 436.

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 131

Paul," and conclude from it that Paul has not a brother
(see Judgment and Reasoning Chapters II and III), because
he fails to distinguish his own point of view from that of
others. May not the same be true of the use of the first
person ? The difficulty the child here experiences affects
in fact all the possessive terms. Egger noticed how when
he said to a child of i ; 6, " show me my nose, my mouth,
etc." the child pointed to its own, and to be understood
he had to say " show me Daddy's nose," etc.

Viewed in this Hght the phenomenon is interesting.
Naturally the child who speaks of himself in the third
person, situates what he speaks of within his body. But
he may not have understood that the conception he has
of himself is different from that which others may have.
When he speaks of himself he certainly makes no attempt
to place himself in the position of someone else, but he
beUeves himself to be seeing from the only possible point
of view, the absolute point of view. This fact is important.
It shows that Femand's experience of pain and the
judgment he makes on it are not for him equally internal.
Only the pain is in his own body, whilst his judgment is
made from an undifferentiated point of view that is
common to all. Femand does not realise that it is he
who is judging of himself. If he had been asked where
was his " self," he would have indicated only half of his
consciousness, the half which felt the pain, but not the
half which watched the other suffer.

In short, the child who speaks of himself in the third
person has undoubtedly already in some degree the feeling
of " self " — it seems evident that Baldwin has exaggerated
here — though he may not yet be aware of the " I," if by
" I " we follow William James and mean that element of
the self which watches the life of the rest. This fact alone
is enough to confirm what we stated previously of the
difficulty the child experiences in establishing the limits
between his own internal world and the world that is
common to all.

§ 2. Participation and Magical Practices. — In the
preceding pages we dealt at some length with the par-
ticular nature of the child's consciousness of self because we
regard the phenomena involved as of primary importance
in revealing the origins of causality. The most primitive
forms of causahty found in the child seem, in fact, due to

132 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

confusion between reality and thought, or more accurately,
to a constant assimilation of external processes to schemas
arising from internal experience. This is what the two
following sections will attempt to outline, though the idea
will be more fully developed in a later work. In the present
section we shall restrict ourselves to enumerating certain
cases marked by feelings of participation or of magic, and
simply to stating the more systematic cases we have been
able to observe during the researches of which we shall
treat later.

Following the definition of M. Levy-Bruhl, we shaU give
the name " participation " to that relation which primitive
thought beheves to exist between two beings or two
phenomena which it regards either as partially identical
or as having a direct influence on one another, although
there is no spatial contact nor inteUigible causal connec-
tion between them. The appUcation of this conception to
the child's thought may be disputed, but it is merely a
question of words. It may be that the child's idea of
"participation" differs from that of the primitive, but
they resemble one another, and this is sufficient to authorise
us in choosing our vocabulary from among the expressions
which have been found most adequate in describing
primitive thought. There is no intention of suggesting the
identity of the different forms of participation that may
be distinguished.

We shall use the term " magic " for the use the indi-
vidual believes he can make of such participation to modify
reality. All magic supposes a participation, but the
reverse is not true. Here again the use of the term " magic"
may be regretted in speaking of the child, but absolutely
no identity is impUed between the child's magic and the
magic of the primitive.

It is further necessary to distinguish j>articipation and
magic from the child's animistic behefs, that is to say from
his tendency to endow inanimate things with life and
consciousness. The two groups of phenom"na are closely
related. For example many children believe the sun

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 133

follows them. When the emphasis is on the spontaneity
of the sun's action, it is a case of animism. When they
believe it is they who make the sun move, it is a question
of participation and magic. Obviously they are very
similar beliefs, but it is worth distinguishing them since
we shall be led to the conclusion that animism is derived
from participation and not vice versa. At any rate it is
just at the time when the feelings of participation arise
from the differentation of the self and the external world,
that the self assumes magical powers and that in return,
beings are endowed with consciousness and life.

The attempt must now be made to classify the different
types of participation manifested by the child and the
magical practices to which certain of them give rise.
From this Hst must naturally be excluded all that belongs
strictly to play.. Play is continuously interwoven with
participations, but they are of a type unrelated to con-
viction and they must therefore be disregarded.

Participations and magical practices may be classified
from the point of view of the content and dominating
interest or from the point of view of the structure of the
causal relationship. From the point of view of the content,
magical relationship may be connected with fear, remorse
{e.g. in connection with onanism), desire and fourthly with
the feelings of order governing nature. These four interests
will be clearly marked in the examples which follow later,
but in the present case a classification from the point of
view of structure will prove most useful and we shall
therefore group the examples we have been able to collect
into the following four categories : —

(i) Firstly, there is magic by participation between actions
and things. The child performs some action or mental
operation (counting, etc.), and believes that this action or
operation exercises, through participation, an influence
on a particular event he either desires or fears. These
actions tend to become symbolical, in the sense that they
become detached from their primitive context, just as
conditioned reflexes become detached from their objects

134 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

and become mere signs. (2) There is magic by partici-
pation between thought and things, when the child is under
the impression that reality can be modified by a thought,
a word, or a look, etc. ; or a psychological characteristic,
such as laziness, for example, may be materialised, and a
lazy person regarded as giving out a substance or force
which can act of its own accord. Here again the partici-
pation between thought and things gives rise to actions
which tend to become symboUcal. (3) There is magic by
participation between objects, when two or more things are
regarded as exerting influence on one another, attracting
or repulsing one another, etc., by simple participation,
and the magic consists in using one of these things to
influence the others. (4) Finally, there is magic by partici-
pation of purpose. In this case objects are regarded as
living and purposive. There is animism. The participation
consists in beUeving that the wUl of one object can act
of itself on that of others and the magic Hes in making use
of this participation. The most common form is magic by
commandment, e.g. ordering the clouds or sun to go away.
In the last two cases also, there is sometimes a tendency
towards symboUsm.

We shall now give some examples of the first group,
that of magic produced by action. Naturally, it is only
memories of childhood that we have been able to collect,
since children are chary of speaking of their magic during
the period when they practise it. We shall quote first of
all an interesting case which it is true overlaps into both
the first and second groups but which shows emphatically
to what lengths the child's magic can go.

This is the case of Edmund Gosse. The detailed and
moving autobiography of Father and Son certainly makes
it clear that a leaning towards magic was the last thing
to be naturally supposed from this child's education. His
parents had strictly forbidden all imaginative hfe. He
was never told stories. His only reading was either pious
or scientific. His religion was rigidly moral and devoid
of all mysticism. He had no friends. But through lack of

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 135

poetry or concrete education, the child's intellectual
activity broke out between the ages of 5 and 6 with a
wealth of magic, which seems to have been singularly rich : —

" Being as restricted, then, and yet as active my mind took
refuge in an infantile species of natural magic. This con-
tended with the definite ideas of religion which my parents
were continuing, with too mechanical a persistency , to force
into my nature and it ran parallel with them. I formed
strange superstitions, which I can only render intelligible
by naming some concrete examples. I persuaded myself that
%f I could only discover the proper words to say or the proper
passes to make, I could induce the gorgeous birds and
butterflies in my Father's illustrated manuals to come to
life and fly out of the book, leaving holes behind them.
I believed, that, when at the Chapel, we sang, drearily and
slowly, loud hymns of experience and humiliation, I could
boom forth with a sound equal to that of dozens of singers,
if I could only hit upon the formula. During morning
and evening prayers, which were extremely lengthy and
fatiguing, I fancied that one of my two selves could flit
up, and sit clinging to the cornice, and look down on my
other self and the rest of us, if I could only find the key.
I laboured for hours in search of these formulas, thinking
to compass my ends by means absolutely irrational. For
example, I was convinced that if I could only count con-
secutive numbers long enough, without losing one, I should
suddenly, on reaching some far distant figure, find myself
in possession of the great secret. I feel quite sure that nothing
external suggested these ideas of magic. . . .

"All this ferment of mind was entirely unobserved by my
parents. But when I formed the belief, that it 'was necessary
for the success of my practical magic, that I should hurt
myself, and when, as a matter of fact, I begdn, in extreme
secrecy, to run pins into my flesh and bang my joints with
books, no one will be surprised to hear that my Mother's
attention was drawn to the fact that I was looking ' delicate.' "

The examples to be quoted are mostly not so clear as
the above, but our aim is to establish precisely aU the
intermediate stages between the most subtle and the
crudest and least " magical " types. In the example of
Gosse it is naturally the practices mentioned at the end
(the pins and the blows) that fall into the category of magic

136 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

through action. But under the same heading we may also
place magic based on arithmetic : such as counting very
fast or without a mistake as a means of securing a par-
ticular object. Such magic, based on arithmetical cal-
culation or on counting, is very common. The following
are further examples : —

From one of our collaborators : "To succeed in any
of the various things I was keen about {to win in a game,
to have fine weather for an excursion, etc.) I used to do as
follows : I would hold my breath and if I could count up to
ten {or some other number, easier or harder according to the
importance of the event) I felt sure of gaining what I wanted."

The fact of success in counting whilst holding the
breath is thus regarded both as the sign and the cause of
success in the event desired,

A boy of about ten, given to masturbation, was in the
habit of counting up to a given number (lo or 15) whenever
he was questioned or in any other circumstances, to
prevent himself saying anything stupid or to obtain some-
thing he desired. The origin of the habit in this particular
case, seems to have been as follows. In moments of
temptation the child used to count up to a certain number
and then to succumb or not to the temptation according
as he had succeeded or not in reaching the number under
certain conditions. The habit had become a means of
decision and finally a magical process.

Here again, the operation of counting is at the same
time both sign and cause. Naturally the opposite is found
also, that is to say the operation serves not only for
obtaining something but also for avoiding rriisfortune.
This happens particularly often with those children — a
much greater number than would be supposed — who are
haunted every night by fears of death, either for them-
selves or their parents. On this subject one of our
collaborators has very clear recollections : —

Every evening, from about the age of 6 to S, I was terrified
by the idea of not waking up in the morning. I used to feel
my heart beating and would try, by placing my hand on the
chest, to feel if it wasn't stopping. It was undoubtedly in
this way that I started counting to reassure myself. I counted

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 137

very quickly between each heat and if I could succeed in
passing a certain number before a particular beat or in
making the beats correspond with even or with uneven
numbers, etc., I felt reassured. I have forgotten the details,
but I can remember the following very clearly. At regular
intervals, from the pipes of the radiator in my room, would
come a sudden, deep, rattling sound which often used to make
me jump. I used to use this as a proof of whether I should
die or not ; I would count very fast between one rattle and
the next, and, if I passed a certain number, I was saved.
I used the same method to know whether my father, who slept
in the next room, was on the point of death or not."

The relation of this fact to the manias of the insane
and their defensive gestures is clearly brought out. But
this example is only the negative aspect of the preceding
cases of magic.

The following memory dates from between the ages of
9 and II : —

" / often accompany my father when he goes to the rifle
range. While my father shoots I sit on a bench. He gives
me his cigar to hold. I imagine I can influence the accuracy
of his shot by the position of the cigar. According as the
cigar is almost vertical {the lighted end downwards) , or at an
angle of 90°, 120° or 180°, the shot will be only fairly good,
good or excellent. The shot never entirely misses since my
father is a good shot. However, after two or three good shots
have been fired, I lower the cigar for a while, with the feeling
that he cannot keep this up." The narrator insisted that it
was not in the least a game, and that when pointing the
cigar in a particular direction he really believed he was
influencing his father's shot.

Other operations or magical actions are based on the
pleasurable effect of rhythm or some other aesthetic
pleasure which gives rise either to positive acts of magic
or to obsessions of a negative nature. Such is the well-
known sensation of pleasure common to children, of not
walking on the lines of the pavement, or of jumping a
stone at every step, etc.

The sensation of pleasure may be entirely aesthetic or
completely ridiculous in its origin. But the child has only

138 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

to desire something strongly or fear something and the
game becomes a test, and its success or failure are regarded
as the sign and cause of the realisation of what is desired
or feared, as in the following example given by one of our
collaborators : —

" When I particularly wanted something I often used to
step on every other stone as I walked on the pavement. If
I succeeded in doing this as far as the end of the pavement
it was a sign that what I wanted would happen. Or I would
touch the stones of a wall, tapping every third stone and if
I thus succeeded in reaching the last stone of the wall, I was
certain of m,y success, etc.

Another used to feel threatened by danger if he walked
on one of the hnes between the stones. If he started by
walking on one of these Unes he kept it up all the way so
as to make the danger less.

The following is another example of these rhythmic
movements performed to assure the realisation of some
event : —

A child, given to masturbation, whom we shall call Clan,
was afraid of being overcome by laziness or stupidity
(" abetissement "). His drelms and his plans for the
future showed henceforth a compensating tendency and
he planned to become " a great man." To bring this about
he adopted the following practice, which must have lasted
for some time : " When crossing X {a public square)
I used to tap the hooped railings enclosing the green with
my tram season-ticket. To do this I had to stoop down. I
used to do it every morning in order to become a great man."

The following is, strictly speaking, more nearly a case
of obsession than of magic, but it seems to be the negative
version of a case of magic given later; —

One of us can remember, in addition to the pavement
rite, a feeling of being impelled to replace every stone she
involuntarily moved when walking, or if not, whatever
desire she had at the moment would not be realised.

The curious recollection of the childhood of Mile Ve,
reported by Flournoy, should probably find a place here : —

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 139

" One of my most distant memories relates to my mother.
She was very ill and had been in bed several weeks and a
servant had told me she would die in a few days. I must
have been about 4 or 5 years old. My most treasured
possession was a little brown wooden horse, covered with
' real hair ' .... A curious thought came into my head :
I must give up my horse in order to make my mother better.
It was more than I could do at once and. cost me the greatest
pain. I started by throwing the saddle and bridle into the
fire, thinking that ' when it's very ugly, I shall be able to
keep it.' I can't remember exactly what happened. But I
know that in the greatest distress I ended by smashing my
horse to bits, and that on seeing my mother up, a few days
later, I was convinced that it was my sacrifice that had
mysteriously cured her and this conviction lasted for a long
while." ^

This idea of the magical power of sacrifice reappears in
a simpler form in the idea of obtaining some desired object
by means of a painful or tiresome action. The following
is an example : —

In order not to be questioned in class or bothered by
his teacher, a boy was in the habit of putting on and
taking off his boots several times before going to school
in the morning. His idea was that the more annoying the
performance of the rite, the greater his chance of being
favoured by Fate.

Finally, there are innumerable rites to ward off danger : —

A boy who lived in a somewhat lonely house was always
very frightened on the evenings when his parents were
out. Before going to bed he used to draw the curtains by
unwinding a sort of roller. He had always the idea that
if he could succeed in drawing the curtains very quickly
the robbers would not come. But if the curtain took some
time to unroll then the house was in danger.

This fact, like those which follow, indicates clearly the
the origin of these feelings of participation and of magic
caused by a particular movement. The majority of little
girls experience in bed at night the most violent fears of
the dark and of strange sounds. There are various

^ Archives de Psychologie, Vol. XV (1915), pp. 1-224.

140 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

measures of precaution to which they usually turn, sach as
hiding under the clothes, turning the back to the door,
drawing the blankets up exactly to the chin, etc. There
is here nothing magical since these are simply means of
protection. But some of these movements become dis-
sociated from their primitive context and become rites,
like the case of the curtain just quoted, and thence acquire
an intrinsic value of their own. Then appears the magic : —

One of us remembers always feeling a sense of protection
so long as she had her arms pressed against her body.

Another felt protected if on getting into bed, the clothes
were completely tucked in all round so that she could slip
in without anywhere unmaking the bed. If by chance
she found the clothes not tucked in, or that they had
come unmade as she got in, she felt herself threatened by
danger.

The origin of the movements is obvious ; to draw a
curtain, to brace oneself, or make sure that no one has
touched the bed ; but according as the movernent loses
its primary significance and becomes effective in itself, it
becomes magical.

Next must be considered the cases of magic through
participaiion between thought and things. Between these
and the preceding there are any number of intermediate
cases as was shown in the examples of magic based on
counting. But the cases to be dealt with now concern
mental elements much more closely related to thought than
numbers, such, for example, as names and words. These
cases thus result directly from the child's realism which
we attempted to analyse in the preceding chapters. In
these chapters we have already seen many cases where
participation was believed to exist between things and
thought, between names and the things named, dreams
and the things dreamed of, etc. The strongest proof that
these participations whose significance we have already
noted, are spontaneous and not produced by our questions,
is that they give rise to the most authentic cases of magic
we found among all the memories of childhood we were

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 141

able to collect, that is to say to cases of magic by means
of names. The following are examples : —

Clan, the child already quoted, first succumbed to
onanism at Mayens-de-Sion. When he came home, he
tried under the sway of remorse not to suppress the
memory but to suppress the fact itself, or its consequences,
that is to say the stupidity (" abetissement ") he feared
(see above). To bring this about it was against the actual
name of Mayens-de-Sion that he set himself : " / did all I
could to break the name of Mayens-de-Sion." To break the
name he simply distorted it. He repeated the name aloud,
pronouncing it in German, MdyensersSyens and accen-
tuating the two syllables " may " and " sey."

In 4he same way, when suffering under the displeasure
of a schoolmaster, he would repeat in his room, once back
from school, the master's surname, not only to make fun
of him but principally (in so far as the recollection is
accurate) to be rid of his influence.

A naturahst, whose work is to-day famous, gave us the
following recollection of his childhood. Seated a couple of
feet away from his cat and staring into the cat's eyes, he
would pronounce many times the formula : " Tin, tin,
pin pin de I'o-ii-in, pin, pin, tin, tin, pin pin de I'o-u-in,
pin pin . . . , etc." So far as the memory is to be trusted
the aim of this formula was to enable the child to project
his personality into the cat : while pronouncing it the
child felt himself pervading the cat's being and thus
dominating it by participation.

One of us used to enjoy playing at schools at home.
She would give good marks to her friends and bad ones to
the children she didn't like, etc., though all the time, of
course, only addressing empty chairs. The next day, at
school, she was convinced of having influenced the questions
that were actually asked, and of having helped her friends
answer well and hindered her enemies.

Other cases of participation between thought and things
rest on a sort of confusion or lack of differentiation between
psychical and material characteristics : —

Clan, like all masturbators, was in fear of losing his
intellectual faculties and becoming " lazy." Whence the
following rite : " When accompanying a particularly lazy
hoy I sometimes chanced to walk hand in hand with him.
Then when I was home again I would say to myself thai to

142 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

hold hands with a lazy hoy will make me lazy too, and 1
must do something against it." Clan would then rub his
hands vigorously.

So also certain rites consist simply in thinking of some-
thing to make a particular event happen or not. (This is
Freud's " all powerful nature of thought.")

It often happens that children — for that matter many
adults too — think the opposite from what they want, as
if reality made a point of intentionally foiling their
desires.

In the same way (according to the memories of child-
hood we have collected), in order to avoid nightmares —
and it will be remembered that up to the age of lo the
origin of dreams is thought to be external — children try
on purpose to think of frightening things and of the usual
subjects of their nightmares so as to make the dream
not come.

The two following cases are further examples of feelings
of participation allied to the power of thought : —

Clan's first attack of masturbation was brought about
by the sight of a little girl he did not know whom he looked
at one day with thoughts of desire. Afterwards Clan
asked himself " if the little girl could have a baby." Clan
asked a similar question after having peeped through a
keyhole.

The last case is intermediate between this group and the
next : —

One of us can remember how, when he used to play at
marbles, in order to make certain of winning, he would
contrive to play with the marble used by the player who
last won. It was as if the player's skill gave the marble
peimanently good qualities or as if the marble was made
particularly good by the player's luck.

All these cases thus consist in regarding a particular
mental element, such as names, laziness, thought and
dreams, skill, etc. as intimately connected with the things
themselves, and as having its own effective power. Between
these and the third group, that of magic by participation
between objects, are any number of intermediate cases.

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 143

like the example just quoted of the magical marble, whose
powers are regarded as due not to the skill of the player,
but to something in the marble. What characterises the
third group is that the magical action is no longer the
direct issue of a movement or thought on the part of
the subject, as was the connection in the two preceding
groups, but that it arises from *an object or a place, etc.,
which the subject uses to influence another object of an
event. The two following are clear examples, in which
the choice of the magical body seems to have been deter-
mined by its resemblance to the object which the subject
seeks to influence : —

One of us relates this recollection, speaking of herself
in the third person : "A little girl of six used to pass often
with her governess by a lake where some rare water-lilies grew.
Every time she would throw some little stones into the water
{always choosing them round and white) and taking care not
to he seen by the governess. She thought that the next day
water-lilies would appear in the place where the stones had
fallen. For this reason, in the hope of thus being able to
reach the flowers she always threw the stones quite near
the edge."

Another of us recalls the following : " When people
plant a flower in a pot they always put a little stone at the
bottom of the pot to prevent the soil being washed away. I had
noticed this but had misinterpreted the reason. I used to
choose my stone with the idea that on its colour and shape
depended the life of the plant. It was just as much a question
of the influence of the stone on the plant as of a sort of
sympathy between the stone and me ; the stone collaborated
with me to make the plant grow."

The following is another example, the date of which can
be fixed with certainty between the ages of 10 and 11 : —

One of us used to collect shells from the lake and the
smallest kinds of snails. On his walks he would experience
a number of feelings of participation showing the child's
tendency both to see signs in everything and to confuse
the sign with the cause of an event, the cause being in this
case of a magical nature. Thus, when he was seeking a
particularly rare specimen, and on the way he found some
other interesting specimen he would decide from this

144 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

whether or not he would find the specimen he was seeking.
This was not based in the least on the similar habitat of
the specimens, but solely on occult ties ; such an un-
expected discovery ought to lead to another discovery
during the day. Or again, when from a distance he thought
he saw the particular specimen, but on approaching found
he was mistaken, he concluded that he would not find the
specimen he particularly wanted that day.

Similar to these cases are those where the bond of par-
ticipation lies in places, either favourable or unfavourable.

One of us gives the following : " If on my way to the
dentist I passed by a particular street and the dentist then
hurt tne, I took care, the next time, to go a different way, so
that he would hurt me less."

In this group may be placed also the numerous feehngs
of participation to which behefs concerning the air and
the wind give rise. As wiU be shown in the subsequent
volimie {La Causaliti Physique chez I' Enfant, Chapter I),
children between the ages of 4 and 6 and some even older
do not think that air is present in a room ; but they have
only to shake their hands or wave a fan, etc. to " make
air " (" faire de I'air ") and by this means even believe
they can draw in the air from outside through closed
windows. This is certainly a case of participation, given
that the child neither understands nor attempts to under-
stand the reason for such a phenomenon ; in his eyes, it
is only necessary to wave the hand to bring the air, and
the air produced by the hands has a direct influence on
the air outside.

In the same way, if a child of 4 to 6 is shown a small
steam-engine he will explain the movement of the outside
wheel as directly caused by the fire, even at a distance
(as when the fire is put 50 centimetres away). But the
child will often admit that the air outside comes to help
the fire, and this again is due to a direct and unintelligible
attraction (see La Causaliti Physique, Section IV). There
is thus participation between the air produced by the fire
and the air outside.

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 145

Again the shadow one makes on the table is often ex-
plained by Uttle children as due to a participation with
the shadow of the night or the shadow under the trees.
It is felt that this comes in the moment the hand is placed
over the paper and the shadow of the fingers forms (see
La Causalite Physique, Section III). Here again the child
says clearly that the shadow of the trees " comes," but
he cannot say " how " it comes : he simply states that
the shadow of the hand comes both from the hand and
the trees. It is not a logical identity (as if he were to say
" the shadow of the hand is of the same nature as that
of the trees "), nor is it an intelUgible causal relationship,
it is simply " participation."

Finally comes an example intermediate between this
and the next group. This is the case of a httle girl who
endowed her marbles with powers of influencing one
another, partly from the idea of their possessing a sort of
common essence (those of the same kind necessarily
attracting one another) and partly from a kind of partici-
pation of will similar to the cases of the fourth group : —

" When I had just won certain marbles (by taking them
from my opponent), / never used these marbles to play with
again, because I thought I was more likely to lose these than
the others, since I had the idea that they would be in some
way attached to their former surroundings and have a ten-
dency to return to their former owner.

Finally, there is the fourth group of participations, those
due to a common will and which give rise to acts of magic
by commandment. The cases of this group arise as much
from the child's magic as from animism. Two fundamental
characteristics are at their origin, namely, the child's ego-
centricity which makes him beheve the world to centre
in himself, and his respect for his parents which tends
always to make him believe that the world is governed by
moral rather than physical laws. Animism and artificiahsm
result from this attitude of mind as soon as it becomes
crystallised in definite conceptions. But, before there has
been any reflection, this attitude already gives rise to

146 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

feelings of participation between the child and objects.
These are of great variety and must be stated now before
they are examined in greater detail and in relation to
each group of phenomena.

First come participations in connection with the material
nature of thought. Thought is identified with voice, and
is in some cases held to be of air, the air being regarded
as both internal and external. Whence arise the beUefs
according to which air and smoke are drawn to us and
become one with our breath or our thought (see Chapter I,
§§ I, 2 and 3). The same convictions are found concerning
dreams. As we have already seen, all these convictions
are due to a comparatively simple reaUsm and result
solely from a lack of differentiation between thought and
things.

Then there are a more numerous group of participations
connected with the idea of the obedience of objects.
Objects obey either the child himself or adults. The
following are examples of the first type, beginning with
two recollections : —

One of our friends, now a teacher, believed during many
years of his childhood (though he had never before revealed
it) that he was the " ruler " of the world, that is to say
that he could make the sun, the moon, the stars and the
clouds move as he willed them.

Clan also had the idea that the stars were his " property."

These two examples are quoted because they so closely
resemble the convictions we have been able to observe
directly. We shall in fact show later (Chapter VII, § 2) that
before the age of 8, the majority of children believe that
the sun and stars follow them. With many, however, the
emphasis is laid less on the spontaneity of the sun than
on the power of the child himself. The following examples
are very clear in this respect and concern the movements
of the clouds as well as those of the sun and stars.

Nain (4 J) : " Can the moon go wherever it wants, or
does something make it move ? — It's me, when I walk."
And again : " // comes with me, it follows us."

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 147

GiAMB (7) : " Does the moon move or not ? — It follows
us. — Why ? — When we go, it goes. — What makes it move ?
— We do. — How ? — When we walk. It goes by itself."
Giamb then invents the explanation that it is the wind
that blows the sun and the moon, but he maintains all
the while that it is we who control this movement : "If
we didn't move, would the moon go on or not ? — The moon
would stop. — And the sun ? — It goes with us too."

Tag {6^) : " Have you seen the clouds moving ? —
Yes. — Can you make them move yourself ? — Yes, by
walking. — What happens when you walk ? — It makes them
woyg.— What makes them move ? — We do, because we
walk and then they follow us. — What makes them follow
us ? — Because we walk. — How do you know that ? —
Because when you look up in the sky, they are moving. —
Could you make them go the other way if you wanted
to ? — By turning round and walking back. — And what
would the clouds do then ? — They'd go back. — Can you
make anything else move from far away without touching
it ? — The moon. — How ? — When you walk, it follows you.
The stars too. — How ? — When you move they follow too.
The ones that are behind follow the moon."

Sala (8) : " Have you seen the clouds moving ? What
makes them move ? — When you move they move too. —
Can you make them move yourself ? — Everyone can by
walking."

Tuli (10) : " What makes the clouds move ? — It's when
you walk."

Port (9) said that the clouds move when God moves,
and then added spontaneously : " Even when people walk
in the street, that makes the clouds move. — Then can you
make them move yourself ? — Yes. Sometimes when I'm
walking I look at the sky. I see that the clouds are moving,
then I see the moon doing it too when it's there."

The nature of these participations and magical ideas
is clear. There is no direct participation of substance,
there is simply participation of action and principally of
purpose : we can command the sun and the clouds, since
there is " participation " between their will and our will.
It may happen, however, that this dynamic participation
involves participation of substance, as for example in
cases involving the air, shadows, etc. It seems to children
that we possess the power of attracting the air or shadows,

148 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

whilst producing them ourselves at the same time. We
have classed these cases in the group of participations
between objects (third group) but their origin lies evidently
in a simple dynamic participation of the type quoted
above. A case, quoted by Sully, and classed with justice
as a magical idea by Leuba and by Delacroix^ shows
clearly this relationship between dynamic participation
and participation between objects. " A little girl was
out for a walk with her mother one very windy day. The
buffeting of the wind delighted her at first, but she soon
grew tired of it : ' Wind make Mamma's hair untidy ;
Babba (her name) make Mamma's hair tidy, so wind not
blow again.' Three weeks later the child was out of doors
in the rain ; she said to her mother : ' Mamma, dry
Babba's hands, so not rain any more.' The child,"
SuUy adds, " is envisaging the wind and the rain as a kind
of naughty child who can be got to behave properly by
effacing the effects of its naughtiness. In other words
they are both to be deterred from repeating what is
objectionable by a visible and striking manifestation
of somebody's objection or prohibition." ^

This commentary shows clearly the moral and dynamic
origin of these participations. But from the dynamic
participation which consists in relating the wind's will to
our own will, to material participation which consists
in relating the air we make by waving our hands to the
atmosphere itself, is surely not far.

The following is a good example of a dynamic partici-
pation becorhing material and recalling, moreover, the most
striking cases of participation among primitives.

James quotes the case of a deaf-mute who became a
professor and gave his recollections (in the third person).
This is extracted from recollections relating to the moon ^ :

^ See Dela-cioix, La riligion et la foi, pp. 27-42. Alcan, 1924; see the
relationship established by Delacroix between magic and desire. See
also Leuba, La psychologie des phinomines riligieux, Chap. VIII.
Alcan, 1914,

^ Studies of Childhood, p. 80.

^ See Phtlos. Rev., I (1892), pp. 613-24.

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 149

He asked himself with astonishment why the moon
appeared regularly. He thought it must have come out
just in order to see him. He began to speak to it then and
imagined he could see it smile or frown. Finally, he made
the discovery that he had been beaten much more often
when the moon was visible. It was as if it watched him
and reported his misdemeanours to his governess (he
was an orphan). He often asked himself who it could be.
At last he decided that it was his mother, because whilst
his mother had been alive he had never seen the moon.
He went to church on Sunday imagining that the moon
wanted him to go, as he had been accustomed to go with
his mother. His conscience developed, thanks above all
to the moon's influence ^it was a full moon on the evening
when he discovered that some money he had pilfered had
disappeared from where he had hidden it).

This extract makes clear participation connected with
the origin of things, in which magic is attributed to the
adult much more than to the child or to the things them-
selves. In these cases there is equally a transition from
dynamic to material participation. In the most primitive
states the child has simply the impression that his parents
command the world. For example, there is participation
between the sun and men in the sense that the sun has
no other reason for existing nor any other activity than
furthering the interests of man. Thus, when the child asks
himself, or when we ask him, how the sun began, he
obviously answers that the sun was made by man, that
it results from man (est " ne " de I'homme) etc. The
belief in a common origin results from dynamic partici-
pation.

We shall find numerous examples of such feehngs of
participation, which precede and announce the more
strictly artificialist beliefs. They characterise what we
shall caU the stage of " diffuse artificiahsm." We mention
them now, since they too give rise, if not to actual magical
practices at any rate to a predisposition towards magic.
Cases have often been quoted of children begging their
parents to stop a storm, or making some similar sort of
impossible demand, as if their parents had the power of

150 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

doing all things. Thus Mme Klein has seen her child
asking that spinach shall be turned into potatoes by
cooking it.^ M. Oberholzer quotes the case of a little girl
who begged her aunt to make the rain come.^ M. Bovet
recalled the amazement and shock it was to Hebbel, as a
child, to see his father in despair at the damage caused by
a storm : Hebbel thus realised that his father could not
be all-powerful.3 M. Reverdin recounts the following
observation: "Whilst walking in a garden with his son
aged 3 years 4 months, he noticed about 50 httle beads
scattered on the path. The child did not see them. To
make him find them, M. Reverdin traced a circle on the
path round some of the beads, telHng the child he would
find a bead in the middle of the ring. After a moment or
so the child wanted to play the principal role and started
making circles himself, thinking that the beads would
necessarily be found inside them."* Such a case may
indeed be merely an instance of " false reasoning " ; ^ the
appearance of the bead followed the drawing of a circle,
therefore it was the drawing that caused the bead to
appear. But it certainly seems as if, in the particular
case, there is added to this the child's impUcit faith in the
power of the adult.

§ 3. The Origins of Participation and Magic as
Manifested in the Child. — Like animism and artificial-
ism, of which we shall treat later, the participations and
magic manifested by the child seem to have a double
origin. They can be explained as due to phenomena either
of the individual or of the social order : the first is realism,
that is, a confusion between thought and things, or
between the self and the external world ; the second is
the translation into the physical world of the ideas evoked

1 Imago, Vol. VII, p. 265.

2 Spielrein, Archives de Psychologic, XVIII, p. 307.

' Bovet, Revue de theologie et de philosophie, pp. 172-3. (Lausanne),
1919.

* Archives de Psychologic, Vol. XVII, p. 137.

' See I. Meyerson, Annie psychologtque, XXIII, pp. 214-222.

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 151

in the child's mind by his relations with the persons
surrounding him.

Let us first examine the part played by reahsm and
consider under this head two of the psychological theories
of magic recently put forward.

In the first place, as is well known, Frazer sees in magic
simply the application to external causaUty of those laws
of resemblance and contiguity which govern the association
of our ideas. It is evident, however, that this conception
explains principally the form the magic takes ; it does
not account either for the behef in its efficacy, which
accompanies the magical action, or for the irrational
nature of the associations such a behef supposes.

To explain the belief in its efficacy, Freud has put
forward the following theory. The belief results from
desire. Underlying all magic is a special affective quahty.
The same characteristic is found with the insane ; an
insane person believes he has only to think of something
to make a particular event occur or not. As a patient
told Freud, this attitude involves belief in the " all-
powerfulness of thought." But what affective conditions
give rise to this behef ? By analysing his patients, Freud
was led to consider magic as a result of " narcissism."
Narcissism is a stage in the affective development, during
which the child is only interested in himself, in his own
desires and thoughts. This stage precedes the concen-
tration of any permanent interest or desire in the person
of others. But, says Freud, the narcissist being, so to
speak, in love with himself, his wishes and his own desires
appear to him charged with a special value, whence the
belief in the necessary efficacy of each of his thoughts.

This theory of Freud is of undoubted interest and the
connection it establishes between magic and narcissism
appears well founded. Only, the manner in which Freud
explains and conceives this connection seems somewhat
unintelligible.

In fact it gives to the infant narcissist the qualities
of an adult in love with himself and aware of it, as if the

152 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

infant could clearly distinguish his self from others. And
also, it seems to claim that if a desire has an exceptional
value, belief in its necessary realisation must follow.
There is here a twofold difficulty.

What is it, as a matter of fact, that prevents us believing
in the automatic realisation of our desires ? It is that
we know them to be subjective and that we distinguish
them from the desires of others and from the realities
that the world forces us to recognise. Thus if the infant
narcissist believes in the all-powerfulness of thought, it
is evidently because he does not distinguish his thought
from that of others, nor his self from the external world ;
in other words he is not aware of his self. If he is in love
with himself, it is not because he knows his self, but
because he ignores all that is outside his dream and his
desires.

Narcissism, that is to say absolute egocentricity, cer-
tainly gives rise to magical conviction, but only in so far
as it implies absence of consciousness of self. The term
" solipsism " has been used in connection with infants :
but the real solipsist does not feel that he is alone, and
cannot know his self for the simple reason that we only
feel ourselves to be alone after others have left us and
that he who has never had the idea of a possible plurality
cannot have in the least degree the feehng of his in-
dividuality. Thus the solipsist probably feels himself
identical with the images he perceives ; he has no con-
sciousness of his self, he is the world. We may thus speak
of narcissism and maintain that the infant regards every-
thing in terms of his own pleasure, but on condition that
we remember that narcissism is accompanied by the most
complete realism, in the sense that the infant can make no
distinction between a self that commands and a not-self
that obeys. At the most the infant distinguishes a desire,
arising he knows not whence, and events which happen
to bring about its fulfilment.

If we admit this assimilation of the world to the self
and the self to the world, participation and magical

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 153

causality become intelligible. On one hand, the move-
ments of the body itself must be confused with any
sort of external movement, and on the other, desires,
pleasures and pains must be situated, not in the self, but
in the absolute, in a world which, from the adult point of
view, we should describe as common to all, but which
from the infant's point of view is the only possible world.
It follows when the infant sees his limbs move at his own
will, he must feel that he is commanding the world. Thus
on seeing a baby joyfully watching the movements of his
feet, one has the impression of the joy felt by a god in
directing from a distance the movements of the stars.
Inversely, when the baby takes delight in movements
situated in the outside world, such as the movement of
the ribbons of its cradle, he must feel an immediate bond
between these movements and his delight in them. In
short, for a mind that cannot distinguish, or does so but
dimly, the self from the external world, everything par-
ticipates in the nature of and can influence everything
else. To put it another way, participation results from
a lack of differentiation between the consciousness of the
action of the self on the self and the consciousness of the
action of the self on things.

It is here that the second factor essential to the ex-
planation of participation and magic comes in. This is
the part played by social environment, that is, the role
of the parents. The hfe of the suckling is not, in fact,
distinguishable in its origin from that of the mother. Its
desires and most fundamental needs are necessarily met
by a reply from the mother or from someone in its
immediate surroundings. Every cry of the baby leads to
an action on the part of the parents, and even the desires
it can least express are always foreseen. In short, if the
baby can barely distinguish its own movements from
movements outside itself, there must be for it a complete
continuity between its parents' activities and its own.

Two consequences follow. Firstly, the feelings of
participation must evidently be strengthened by this

154 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

continual response of the environment. Secondly, the
conduct of people towards it gradually gives the baby the
habit of command. The parents, like the parts of its own
body, Uke all the objects that can be moved by the parents
or by its own actions (food, toys, etc.), make up a class of
things obedient to its desires and, since this class is much
the most interesting, the whole world is conceived as of
this fundamental type. Whence arises the habit of
commanding things by magic.

But let us leave this primitive stage, the description
of which is naturally to be taken as purely schematic.
The later stages, during which the self is gradually dis-
tinguished from the external world, provide in fact very
full data as to the nature of the processes whose genesis
we have so far merely conjectured.

As we have already seen in the preceding chapters, the
child does not simultaneously classify as internal or
psychic the various contents of its thought and experience.
Words and dreams, for example, are comparatively late
in being assigned to thought and the self. And since
certain contents are projected into things, whilst others
are regarded as internal, it follows that the child must
necessarily feel all manner of participations between
himself and things. Realism, indeed, implies a feeling of
participation between the world and the self, for since it
consists in regarding as belonging to things and as
originating in things what in fact results from the child's
own activity, it follows that this activity is conceived in
return as something completely immersed in the things
and all-powerful over them. This connection between
realism and magical participation is shown in three
different ways.

The first, that is to say the simplest, to interpret consists
in the attachment of thought and its instruments to things
themselves — the counterpart in magic being participation
between thought and things (the second of the four
groups distinguished in § 2). In fact, from the moment
the child confuses thought, or names, etc., with things,

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 155

through not reahsing the internal and subjective nature
of the act of thinking, it becomes natural for him to use
these names or thoughts to influence things. Viewed in
this light, all the cases of the second group quoted in the
preceding section are easily expUcable. To distort a name
in order to prevent the consequences of some event or as
a means of defence against a master follows as a natural
result of regarding names as bound up in the nature of
actual things and persons. To shake the hands to free
them of the contagious effects of laziness follows as a
matter of course if the psychical and the physical are
confused after the manner of the chOdren studied in
Chapter I, It is harder to explain why children should think
the opposite from what they v/ant or think of frightening
things in order not to dream of them, for this supposes the
endowing of fate and dreams with will. The realism in
these cases is accompanied by animism. But they are
none the less based on a certain realism similar to that
which characterises the previous cases ; it Ues in the idea
that thought can insert itself directly into the real and
thus influence events.

The second manner in which the connection between
realism and magic appears Hes in the attachment of the
sign to the reality, which is shown in the magic provoked
by action (first of the groups distinguished in § 2). Actions,
in fact, are symbols or signs in the same way as are words,
names, or images, and as the child regards every sign as
participating in the nature of the thing signified or every
sjnnbol as adhering to an actual object, so actions are
regarded as having the powers attributed to words and
names. This realism of action is thus only a particular
case of the reaUsm of signs. We must now try to analyse
the relationship between magic by action and child
reahsm in general.

Two types of case exist : those in which the magical
gesture is the symbolical reproduction of an action in
itself reasonable, and those in which the magical gesture
is symbohcal from the beginning. In both cases the magic

156 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

arises from a confusion between sign and cause, that is
from making the sign reaUstic.

Examples of the first type are the more rare. But
the cases of magic relating to fear given in § 2 may be
quoted as instances. The evolution of this type of magic
seems to be as follows. The child begins by performing
actions which contain no element of magic, but which, in
their original context are simply ordinary acts of protection
against robbers or other wicked persons ; such as to lower
the curtains so as not to be seen, to see that the bed-clothes
are tucked in all round so as to make sure no one is hiding
either in the bed or under it, to press the arms to the
sides, to stiffen one's self or make one's self smaller. But
with repetition these actions lose all rational relation to
the primitive context and become simply ritual. It is no
longer to prove that nobody is hiding in the room that
the child makes sure the bed-clothes are tucked in, but
simply because it is a habitual action fitting in with a
number of circumstances and which it would be foolish
not to perform punctually. So too, in moments of anxiety
we make a point of observing ritualistically every detail
of our habitual routine, since it is impossible to foresee
what may not be the effect of their neglect and because
fear, depriving us of the power of reflection, makes us all
the more conservative (automatic action taking the place
of intelligence). For a rational mind — that is to say in
this particular case for a subject conscious of his self and
more or less clearly distinguishing the part of subjective
habits from that of causal sequences bound up with the
events in question and with the external world — the
adherence to practice involved is destined merely to
reassure us, each action being regarded as a proof that we
are behaving as normally as usual. But for a realist
mind — that is to say a mind which confuses the internal
with the external — each of these actions becomes sym-
boUcal and is then regarded as the psychical cause as well
as the sign : the fact that the bed is properly made
becomes not merely the sign but actually the cause of

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 157

security. Or rather the action becomes symbohcal in so
far as it is ritual, but a cause, in so far as it is regarded
as bound up with the events themselves. This process is
very clear in the case quoted in § 2, where the rapidity
with which the curtain is drawn becomes a magical means
of protection, symbohcal because withdrawn from its
original context but efficacious because the symbol has
remained attached to what it represents.

The examples of the second type in which the magical
gesture is s3TiiboUcal from the outset can be similarly
explained, except that the action is related to the primitive
context by simple association rather than as a part of a
whole. Take for example the cases of rhythmic movements
(quoted in § 2), since these are the simplest. They start
either as a game or as some sort of aesthetic pleasure, such
as the fun of walking on the pavement without stepping
on the hues of the paving-stones, or of touching all the
bars of a railing without missing one, or of replacing every
stone kicked out of place, etc. Now suppose that the
child, given to one of these habits, experiences one day a
particular desire or fear. He will take care to follow his
usual habits on that day, feeling in them the same need
of adherence to practice ^ that was referred to above
and in such a way that the action becomes one with the
affective circumstances, the action being related to the
whole by a sort of conditioned reflex or simply by syn-
cretism. To a mind both syncretic and reahst at the same
time, such a bond leads to magic, for the action becomes
symbohcal and any symbol of success becomes a cause of
success. To succeed in walking on a pavement without
touching the lines becomes the sign that the thing desired
wiU happen, and then the symbohcal action takes on
powers of its own, in so far as these signs are all regarded
as one with the thing they signify.

^ For the part played by this need of adhering to practice, cp.
I. Meyerson, Annie Psychologique, XXIII, pp. 214-222. The writer
desires in justice to attribute to Meyerson all that is sound in the
present section. For the errors, if errors there be, he takes full
responsibihty himself. See Appendix.

158 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

In short, cases of magic by participation of action and
of things can be explained in the same way as cases of
participation between thought and things. They result
from the realist attitude, that is to say from the projection
of mental relationships into things ; every sign is regarded
as a part of an actual thing and tends thus to be taken
for its cause.

There is yet a third manner in which realism leads to
magical practices ; this is the belief in participation
between objects themselves (the third of the groups
distinguished in § 2). The position is more comphcated
in this case ; the subject acts on an object by means of
another object and regards the two objects as influencing
one another by participation. According to Frazer it is
simply a case of making association by resemblance or
contiguity objective. But such a solution is too simple,
for it remains to be shown how an association of ideas can
be so objective as to become a causal relationship. We
must say rather that realism implies lack of differentiation
between the logical and the causal relationship. As adults
we are aware of an external reality made up of causal
connections and an internal subject who attempts at first
by analogies and then by laws to understand this reality.
To a realist mind, all seems equally real and everything
has its place in the same external scheme. From this
arise the ideas of precausahty and of syncretism that we
have studied elsewhere {Language and Thought, Chapters
IV and V) and which consist in situating in things the
entirely subjective connections suggested to the child by
his egocentric attitude. Magic by participation between
objects is but the final stage in this process. It consists
in regarding individual objects as materially bound to one
another rather than as dependent on laws and conceptions
made by mind.

Take for example the case of the child who believed
that by making a shadow he could bring on the night.
The postulate of this belief lies in supposing that the
shadow is made of night, that it participates in the nature

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 159

of night. To a non-realist mind the meaning of the pro-
position is as follows : the shadow is made by the shade
thrown by the hand just as night is due to the shade
thrown by the earth, therefore the shadow and the night
are similar in that they are both due to the same law.
The similarity Ues in their dependence on a general law.
But, as we have previously attempted to show [Judgment
and Reasoning, Chapter IV) a realist mind, that is to say
a mind unaware of the subjectivity of its point of view,
reasons neither by logical relationships not, therefore, by
generaUsatior^ and necessary deductions, but by syncretic
schemas and by " transduction," that is to say by directly
identifying individual cases. Thus for a reahst mind to
identify a shadow and the night does not mean that he
estabUshes between them a similarity resting on a law,
but that he admits an immediate identity in the individual
cases, in other words material participation ; it is thus
that he explains the shadow as " coming from " the night.
The " transduction " or fusion of individual cases is, in
fact, a realist and not a formal argument. When it is
based on causal sequences that may be directly observed
it appears rational because it leads to the same conclusions
as a formal deduction starting from the same premises.
But when it is based on individual cases, separated in
time and space, it leads to syncretism and in extreme
cases, to participation.

It is evident that this explanation of participation
between objects as due to " transduction " and logical
reaUsm involves certain hypotheses, but we shall deal with
this question less summarily in the subsequent work on
the child's ideas of physical causality.

In conclusion, reahsm — that is to say in its origin,
absence of differentiation between the self (or thought)
and the external world — necessarily develops into ideas
of participation and magic, and in three ways : by
confusion between thought and things, by a realism
which conceives the sign as itself effective and a
part of the thing for which it stands, and finally,

i6o CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

and more generally, by syncretic fusion of individual
substances.

But realism cannot alone explain the whole of child
magic. A large number of the participations the child
conceives suppose animism and if animism results as we
shall see, from egocentric reaUsm, it is thus the product
of participations which the child feels to exist from the
beginning between his parents and himself. In fact,
through not being able to distinguish the psychical from
the physical, every physical phenomenon appears to the
child as endowed with will and also the whole of nature
as obedient to the will of man and his parents. Thus the
majority of objects or events which the child tries to
influence by magic (when he has no other way of acting
on them) appear to him to be fuU of feeUngs and intentions,
either friendly or hostile. From this arise two types of
case. Firstly, many of the rites previously described
consist in a procedure designed to bring good fortune or
to counteract evil. Thus the child who puts on his boots
twice so as not to be questioned in class impUcitly supposes
that fate is moral and wiU take account of the tiresome
exertion involved in putting on one's boots twice. So too,
the child who thinks the opposite from what he desires
supposes fate to be in the habit of reading his thoughts
in order to flout his wishes, etc. Secondly, there are a
whole group of participations which are really animist.
These are of the fourth group (described in § 2), the
group of magical actions through participation of will.
But, even in the phenomena of this fourth group, there is
also an element of reaUsm, without which there would be
no magic.

The cases of the fourth group are, as a matter of fact,
easily explained with the help of the two following facts.
In all these groups there is absence of differentiation or
confusion between the self and the external world, in this
particular group between the subject's own point of view
and external movements : thus the child imagines that
when he moves, the sun and the clouds move too. Secondly,

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION i6i

there is the animist explanation ; the child says the sun
and the clouds are aUve because they foUow him. There
follows, as a consequence, magic by command ; it is only
necessary to command things for them to obey, even at
a distance.

It is in these cases of the fourth group that the tendency
for magical actions or words to become S5mibolical is
naturally weakest, since the magic of this typfe is exercised
by a sort of command which is as real as a conmiand
addressed to a living being. But, as has already been
shown, these participations of will develop into magic by
thought or gesture which tends always to become symbolic.

In conclusion, it would seem that the evolution of
magical actions, whatever the origin of the participations
on which they are based, follows the law of which M.
Delacroix has made such a profound analytical study in
connection with language. Signs begin by being part of
things or by being suggested by the presence of the things
in the manner of simple conditioned reflexes. Later, they
end by becoming detached from things and disengaged
from them by the exercise of intelligence which uses them
as adaptable and infinitely plastic tools. But between
the point of origin amd that of arrival there is a period
during which the signs adhere to the things although
already partially detached from them.^

But, if all magic leads to s5miboUsm, it is, as M.
Delacroix has very justly shown, because all thought is
symboUc. What the magical stage itself shows, in opposi-
tion to the later stages, is precisely that symbols are still
conceived as participating in things. Magic is thus the
pre-symbolic stage of thought. From this point of view
the child's magic is a phenomenon of exactly the same
order as the realism of thought, names and dreams studied
in the previous chapters. For us, concepts, words and
images seen in a dream are all, in different degrees,

^ H. Delacroix, Le Langage et la Pensie. See in particular the
" Remarque finale." Delacroix has elsewhere pointed out very clearly
the relationship between magic and reaUsm {La riligion et la/oi, p. 38).

i62 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

symbols of things. For the child, they actually emanate
from the things. The reason is that we distinguish the
subjective from the objective, whilst the child situates
in things what is due to the activity of his self. In the
same way magical actions are, to the observer, symbols,
but to the subject they are effective, precisely because
they are not yet symboUc and because they participate
in things.

§ 4. Corroborative Proof : Spontaneous Magical
Ideas in the Adult. — Before concluding this chapter
we shall try to see what traces of the magical ideas found
in children and studied in the preceding sections are
present among normal and civilised adults, and if they are
indeed due to the confusions between the self and the
external world which sometimes reappear momentarily in
phenomena connected with imitation and emotion.
Naturally, we shall only consider magic in a strictly
individual sense, such as may be found among intellectual
people and shall set aside all that is " superstition," that
is to say all practices or beUefs that may have been
handed down.

Three cases occur in the adult in which the boundary
between the self and the external world becomes momen-
tarily vague and uncertain, exclusive of course of dreaming
and reverie in which it would be easy enough to find
innumerable feelings of participation. These three cases
are involuntary imitation, anxiety and the state of
" monoldeic " desire. We shall try to show that in these
three cases, the weakening of the sense of personaUty
leads to realism and the realism to more or less clear
magical ideas.

Firstly, involuntary imitation consists in an ideo-motor
adaptation to movements perceived in such a way that
the subject feels to be his own what actually belongs to
another or to the material world. It consists, as Janet
has said, in a confusion between the self and the external
world. Numerous cases are easily found in which the
imitative sympathy is accompanied by a complementary

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 163

attitude which consists in trying to affect the external
world by some action on one's own body. This attitude
closely resembles that of infantile magic. The following
are examples, beginning with the simplest cases : —

Someone has his nose blocked up. A person present
instantly feels the need to blow his own nose in order to
free the speaker's nose.

The speaker has a husky voice, — one feels the desire to
clear one's own throat, again with the feeling of helping
the speaker by so doing.

A person's voice has failed him, — one speaks aU the
louder not to excite him to imitation, but to lend him
one's own strength.

These cases are not very clear, since the implicit attitude
can always be rationahsed, for it is as if the person sym-
pathising is merely trying to set the other an example.
As a matter of fact, observation shows that the action
does not involve any such reasoning, the one simply tries
to be rid of the irritation felt by seeing or hearing the
other.

A collaborator states how before going out with his wife
he waited till she had finished her cigarette whilst he
smoked a pipe. He noticed that he was drawing at his
pipe quicker than usual in order that his wife would finish
her cigarette quicker. For a brief moment the illusion
was complete, that is, until he became aware of it.

In the same way, one often tries to influence objects.
For example, when someone is playing bowls or billiards,
and is in doubt whether the ball will reach its mark, he
wiU strain his body forward eagerly with a strong feeling
of muscular tension, to make the ball roll in the right
direction. He has no distinct idea of what he is doing,
but it is clear he identifies himself with the ball in so far
as he seeks to affect its course by his action. Imitation
thus leads to an attitude of participation.

If anyone sees two cyclists about to collide in the street,
he will himself make a recoihng movement to prevent the
bicycles crashing.

It thus certainly seems as if confusions due to imitation
lead towards magical gestures, which are instantly checked
by our habits of thinking, but which, with minds less

i64 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

conscious of the self, would develop spontaneously. Un-
doubtedly these facts may be considered as being very
far removed from actual magic. But they make up at
any rate and it is this that we are seeking a clear transition
stage between a realism resulting from confusion of the
self and the external world, and magic or participation.*

In moments of anxiety the adult sometimes manifests
the processes described in the case of the child, such as
the desire to observe even the most insignificant details
of the ordinary routine so that the balance of things shall
not be upset. Thus, before giving a lecture, one takes
one's usual walk, etc. ... In states of extreme anxiety
there reappears the child's confusion between the action
made to reassure himself and that destined to maintain
the balance of reality, in other words the magical attitude.
The following is a clear example given by the subject to
whom the preceding examples are also due : —

Just before giving a lecture, being rather nervous, he
took his usual walk. When nearly at the point where he
was in the habit of stopping, he was about to turn back
before reaching the exact spot, when he felt compelled to
go right to the end (50 metres further on) in order that the
lecture should be a success, as if to cut his walk short was
enough to spoil his luck !

In other states of fear, feeUngs of participation are
found mixed with animist ideas, as in states of desire.
The study of these shows that it is generally sufficient
ardently to desire something outside of our control (such
as good weather or anything depending on luck or chance)
in order to have the impression of a sort of hostile power
seeking to mock us. The desire thus becomes h5rpostatised
in the things and by projection personifies fate and events.
This reahst tendency is sufficient to cause any niunber of
magical tendencies.

One of us was travelling at night by bicycle. He had
already gone many miles and was still far from his journey's
end. The wind and the near approach of a storm made

> See Delacroix, La riligion et lafoi, p. 141.

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 165

him begin to feel nervous and this was increased by the
numerous motors he kept meeting which blinded him with
their hghts. He suddenly had the idea that to make
things worse his tires might burst. He then felt distinctly
the need of driving away this idea, in order thai the tire
should not hurst, with the clear impression that to think
of a burst tire was enough to cause the thing actually to
happen !

This is an intermediate case between the realism of
thought (Freud's " all-powerfulness of ideas ") and magic
due to animism.

In the following examples the latter predominates : —

The same subject was looking for mushrooms, and had
already several in his hand which he was about to put in
his knapsack, when he decided to wait till he had found
one or two more and put them all in together. But then
he felt compelled immediately to put away the few he had,
so as not to seem as if he counted on finding others, as
these would certainly never appear if he seemed too sure
of finding them. Another time, he said to himself, as he
was walking, that he would put his coat in his rucksack
as soon as he had found any mushrooms (so as not to
waste time undoing the sack twice). But, a moment later,
not having found any mushrooms, and feeUng his coat too
hot he was about to take it off, when he was struck by the
idea that it would be better not to take off his coat for
fear of not finding any mushrooms.

It should be noted that the subject had never been
superstitious and had never been told during his religious
education (Protestant) anything suggesting magical rites.
The observations noted here are the more or less conscious
tendencies that anyone can observe in himself.

A friend, who is a professor of psychology, made the
three following observations on himself. When walking
after rain, he had the impulse not to take off his water-
proof and put it in his rucksack, in order to prevent the
rain from starting again. . . .

When going to pay a call on anyone he hoped he would
not find at home he was prompted to change his collar and
his clothes in order not to meet them. If he went in his

i66 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

usual clothes they would be sure, on the contrary, to be
at home !

Before giving a garden-party, he refused to have the
garden prepared so that it should not rain, feehng con-
vinced that if it was raked and weeded it would be sure
to rain the whole day.

He resumed his observations thus : " / always tend not
to prepare for anything I want, for fear that what I hope to
avoid should happen."

Magical practices indulged in by card-players are well
known. ^

It is clear enough that all these examples are derived
from a confusion between the self and the external world,
with the animistic tendency acting, in certain cases, as a
secondary factor. All the last examples result from the
extension to the external world of experiences that are
weU known to the self. If an idea is in your mind it acts
on you by suggestion, whence the tendency to try and
drive it away even if it concerns a bicycle tire. Not to
take one's usual walk is enough to put one in bad form,
whence comes the idea that it must be continued right to
the end, and not cut short even by 50 metres in order to
insure that one's lecture shall be received favourably, etc.

In short, these few examples confirm the conclusions
we supposed true in the case of the child, namely that all
reahsm tends to lead to magic. With the adult, realism
still remains in imitation, in fear and in desire, and this
reahsm, although of infinitely smaller extent than that
of the child, is still enough to bring out certain clear
cases of participation and even of magic.

§ 5. Conclusion : Logical and Ontological Ego-
CENTRiciTY. — In the first three chapters we tried to show
that the distinction between thought and the external
world is not innate in the child but is only gradually
evolved and built up by a slow process. One result of
this is of primary importance to the study of causality,
namely that the child is a realist in its thought and that
its progress consists in ridding itself of this initial realism-

^ See H. Delacroix, La religion el lafoi, p. 43 sq. Paris, 1924-

REALISM AND IDEA OF PARTICIPATION 167

In fact, during the primitive stages, since the child is not
yet conscious of his subjectivity, all reality appears to be
of one unvaried type by reason of the confusion between
the data of the external world and those of the internal.
Reahty is impregnated with self and thought is conceived
as belonging to the category of physical matter. From
the point of view of causaUty, all the universe is felt to
be in communion with and obedient to the self. There
is participation and magic. The desires and the commands
of the self are felt to be absolute, since the s\ibject's own
point of view is regarded as the only one possible. There
is integral egdcentricity through lack of consciousness
of self.

We are thus drawn to a conclusion parallel to that to
which we were led by our earlier studies of child logic.
In his manner of reasoning, equally, the child is only
concerned with himself, and ignores more or less com-
pletely the points of view of others. But, in logic also, if
the child sees everything from his own point of view, it
is because he believes all the world to think hke himself.
He has not yet discovered the multiphcity of possible
perspectives and remains bhnd to all but his own as if
that were the only one possible. Also he states his views
without proof smce he feels no need to convince. The
results of this are seen in play, make-behef, the tendency
to believe without proof, the absence of deductive
reasoning ; in syncretism also which connects all things
in terms of primitive subjective associations ; in the
absence of all relativity among ideas ; and finally in
" transductive " reasoning which, through the agency of
syncretism, leads from one particular to another, heedless
both of logical necessity and of general laws, because lack-
ing in feehng for the reciprocal nature of all relationship.

There are thus two forms of egocentricity, the first
logical and the second ontological. Just as the child
makes his own truth, so he makes his own reahty ; he
feels the resistance of matter no more than he feels the
difficulty of giving proofs. He states without proof and

i68 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

he commands without limit . Magic on the ontological
plane, and conviction without proof on the logical ;
participation in the domain of being, and " transduction "
in that of reasoning are thus the two converging products
of the same phenomenon. At the root both of magic and
of conviction without proof he the same egocentric
illusions, namely, confusion between one's own thought and
that of others and confusion between the self and the
external world.

Ontological egocentricity is a principle essential to the
comprehension of the child's world. Just as logical
egocentricity provided the key to the child's judgment
and reasoning, so ontological egocentricity provides that
to his conceptions of reality and causality. Precausality
and finaUsm are, in fact, directly derived from this ego-
centricity, since, in their assumption that man is the
centre of the universe, they consist in a confusion of
relationships of a causal and physical nature with those
of psychological origin. These primitive relationships
come to be justified by animism and artificialism and
from their lingering traces are finally made up the integral
dynamism which impregnates the child's ideas on meteor-
ology and physics.

PART II

ANIMISM

Since the child does not distinguish the psychical from
the physical world, since in the early stages of his develop-
ment he does not even recognise any definite Umits
between his self and the external world, it is to be expected
that he will regard as living and conscious a large number
of objects which are for us inert. This is the phenomenon
we propose to study and we shall describe it by the current
word " animism."

We are aware of all that may be said against the employ-
ment of this word, but we feel none the less that the two
principal objections can be satisfactorily answered.

The first of these is as follows. The term has been used
by Enghsh anthropologists to describe those beliefs accord-
ing to which primitive peoples endow nature with " souls,"
" spirits," etc., in order to explain physical phenomena.
They sought to explain the various means by which the
primitive thus arrives at the notion of a soul and at
the same time they regarded this notion as giving rise to
the animist beliefs. It is well known to-day how super-
ficial was this description of primitive mentaUty. The
penetrating criticism of Levy-Bruhl and the suggestions
made by Baldwin have demonstrated to the point of proof
that the processes of the primitive mind are the exact
opposite from what was supposed. The primitive does
not distinguish mind from matter. It is precisely because
he has not made this distinction that all things appear to
him endowed both with material properties and with will.
It is the existence of this continuum, both moral and physical

170 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

at the same time, which explains the occult participations
with which their magic teems, and which has created the
illusion that primitives believe in a " soul " in the same
sense that we do. M. Levy-Bruhl refuses, therefore, to use
the term animism at all and regards it as bound up with
the erroneous interpretations to which it first lent itself.

But we shall not mean by it any more than the word
implies ; we shall use it merely to describe the tendency
to regard objects as Uving and endowed with will. This
tendency is a fact and in giving it a name we have no
intention of prejudging the issue of its interpretation.
Whatever terminology we may decide to adopt, our
problem is to examine whether animism in the case of
the child depends on the existence of the notion of " mind "
or, on the contrary, on the absence of such a notion.

The second objection that may be raised is certainly
more serious. The term animism denotes a belief peculiar
to primitive peoples. If we use it here in speaking of the
child it is as if we were deciding out of hand the question
as to whether these similar beliefs were identical for the
primitive and the child. But such is not the case. We
shall use the word " animism " simply as a generic term,
leaving the question open whether the various types of
animism have the same or distinct psychological origins.

On these premises, three main problems present them-
selves in the study of child animism. First, there is the
problem of purposiveness : does the child attribute con-
sciousness to the objects which surround him and in what
measure ? The second problem is important to the study
of causality : what does the concept of " life " imply to
the child ? Does life correspond with consciousness or
not, etc. ? Finally, there is the third problem : what
type of necessity does the child see in natural laws, moral
necessity or physical determinism, etc. . . . ?

Each of these problems will be dealt with in a separate
chapter, and in considering the problem of necessity the
attempt will be made to solve the question as to the
genesis of child animism.

CHAPTER V

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO
THINGS

The technique used in the two following chapters is
certainly open to serious criticism but the results un-
doubtedly furnish a number of indications, provided
certain reservations are made.

We started by asking the following questions : " If I
were to prick you with a pin, would you feel it ? " and
" If I were to prick the table would the table feel it ? "
The same question is then applied to stones, flowers,
metal, water, etc., and the child is asked what would
happen if one could prick the sun, the moon, the clouds.
It is naturally necessary and this is the most important
part of the experiment, to ask " Why ? " or " Why not ? "
after each answer. The essential is, in fact, to see if the
child replies arbitrarily or in accordance with a system,
and in the latter case to discover what is the child's latent
conception.

The great danger of this technique lies obviously in
suggestion, both ordinary suggestion and suggestion by
perseveration. To avoid the former the questions must
be given in an unbiased form ; thus, instead of asking
" does the table feel anything ? " the question must be
" does the table feel anything or nothing " ? But accord-
ing to the writer's observations the real danger lies not
in simple suggestion but in perseveration. If the child
starts by saying " yes," (that the flower feels the prick,
for example), he will tend to continue answering " yes "
to all the other questions. If he started by saying " no "

171

172 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

his answers wiU tend equally to perse verate. Two pre-
cautions are, therefore, necessary. The first is to jump
continually from one extreme to another, thus after asking
whether a dog can feel, the question must then be asked
about a stone or a nail (which are usually regarded as
without consciousness) and then for a flower, then for a
wall or a rock, etc. Only after making sure that there is
no {perseveration should the more debatable objects, such
as the sun, the stars, the clouds, etc., be broached. And
here again they must not be presented in order and aU
continuity must be avoided. The second precaution hes in
constantly observing the child's implicit systematisation.
This is not easy, since the youngest children neither knov
how to justify their statements [Judgment and Reasoning,
Chapter I, § 4) nor do they understand their own reasoning
or definitions [Judgment and Reasoning, Chapter IV, §§ i
and 2). Moreover, the child can neither multiply nor
summarise his propositions nor avoid contradictions
[Judgment and Reasoning, Chapter IV, §§ 2-3), which com-
pels the experimenter to interpret as he proceeds, always
a delicate operation. Nevertheless, with practice it
becomes fairly easy to detect those children who answer
at random and to recognise those who have genuinely
some latent scheme of systematisation. The difference
between the two reactions is often evident from the first
questions. It is a good plan, therefore, to see these children
again a few weeks later to see if the systematisation has
been preserved.

But we were soon forced to regard the question of the
prick as too narrow. Animist as the child is, he is still
not so anthropomorphic as might be supposed. In other
words, he wiU easily refuse to admit that the sun could
feel a prick, although beheving, all the while, that the
sun knows that it is moving, and knows when it is day
and when night. He will not admit that the sun can feel
pain yet beheves it to be aware of its own existence. The
questions must, therefore, be varied for each object and
in accordance with its functions. For example, concern-

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 173

ing clouds, the question might be, " when it is cold, do
they feel cold or don't they feel anything at all ? " " when
they are moving, do they know they are moving or not ? "
etc. Further, it is often useful to begin the examination
by a series of questions on the verb " feel " and then to
repeat these, by way of control, concerning the verb " to
know."

We have come to the conclusion that if the questions
are handled with the necessary care, perseveration can be
avoided. But the objection raised to this technique may
go yet deeper. Binet's researches on the testimony of
children have clearly shown the dangers involved in
setting questions in an alternative form, for they force
the solution of a problem that would possibly never have
been presented spontaneously in such a form. Therefore,
the greatest reservation must be made before drawing
conclusions from the results. We give the reader this
preliminary warning so that reading the experiments he
will not criticise us for making premature judgments.

From the results obtained, four groups may reasonably
be distinguished, corresponding grosso modo to four
successive stages. For children of the first stage, every-
thing that is in any way active is conscious, even if it be
stationary. In the second stage consciousness is only
attributed to things that can move. The sun and a bicycle
are conscious, a table and a stone are not. During the
third stage an essential distinction is made between move-
ment that is due to the object itself and movement that is
introduced by an outside agent. Bodies that can move
of their own accord, like the sun, the wind, etc., are
henceforth alone held to be conscious, while objects that
receive their movement from without, Uke bicycles, etc.,
are devoid of consciousness. Finally, in the fourth stage,
consciousness is restricted to the animal world.

It must be stated at the outset that in classifying the
results obtain'ed we shall Regard this outUne as true, that
is to say as adequately representing the spontaneous
development of animism in the child. But owing to the

174 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

defects in the method of examination we cannot with
certainty say of a particular child that it belongs to a
particular stage. It is obvious that two distinct questions
are involved. The first is in some degree statistical, and
its solution is possible despite uncertainties of detail ; the
second is a species of individual diagnosis and involves a
far subtler technique.

Two more points call for attention. The scheme out-
lined above allows certain details to escape notice. Many
children's conceptions of consciousness embody certain
attributes, such as the fact of having blood, of being able
to speak, of being visible (for the wind), etc. But as these
views are individual and have no generality they may be
neglected here.

Secondly, we shall not distinguish children's conceptions
concerning the verb " feel " from those concerning the
verb " know." Such shades of distinction as we have
detected appear to be principally a matter of words.
Possibly children attribute " feeling " to things, longer
than they do " knowing." But we have not sought to
verify this impression as it is of little bearing on the issue.

§ I. The First Stage: all Things are Conscious. —
The child in this stage certainly never says that every-
thing is conscious. He simply says that any object may
be the seat of consciousness at a given moment, that is
to say when the object displays a particular measure of
activity or is the seat of some action. Thus a stone may
feel nothing, but if it is moved, it will feel it. The follow-
ing examples are chosen from amongst the oldest children
found in this stage.

Vel (8^) says that only animals could feel a prick, thus
showing he is able to differentiate in his answers. What
he means, as a matter of fact, is that only animals can
feel pain. Clouds, for example, would not feel . a prick.
" Why not ? — Because they are only air. — Can they feel
the wind or not ? — Yes, it drives them. — Can they feel
heat ? — Yes." But as far as mere consciousness is con-
cerned, any object may be conscious at times : " Can
the bench feel anything ? — No. — If someone burnt it,

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 175

would it feel that ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it would get
smaller. — Does a wall feel anything ? — No. — Would it feel
it if it was knocked down ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because that
would break it." A moment later : " If I pull off this
button (a coat button), will it feel it ? — Yes. — Why ? —
Because the thread would break. — Would that hurt it ? —
No, but it would feel that was tearing it." " Does the moon
know it moves or not ? — Yes. — Does this bench know it
is here ? — Yes. — You really think so ? Are you sure or
not sure ? — Not sure. — What makes you think perhaps it
doesn't know ? — Because it is made of wood. — And what
makes you think it may know ? — Because it is here."
" When the wind blows against the Saleve, does it feel
there is a mountain there or not ? — Yes. — Why ? —
Because it goes over it." " Does a bicycle know it goes ?
— Yes. — Why ? — Because it goes. — Does it know when it
is made to stop ?—Yes. — What does it know with ? —
The pedals. — Why ? — Because they stop going. — You think
so really? — Yes (we laugh). — And do you think I think
so ? — No. — But you think so ? Can the sun see us ?
— Yes. — Have you thought of that before. — Yes. — What
does it see us with ? — With its rays. — Has it got eyes ?
— / don't know."

Vel's answers are interesting because he can differentiate.
Despite our final counter-suggestion, Vel endows the sun
with vision. He refuses to allow pain to the button but
thinks it would be aware of being pulled off, etc. Un-
doubtedly, Vel has never yet asked himself these questions,
but it seems to follow from what he says, that if he has
not yet asked them it is precisely because he confuses
" acting " with " knowing the action is happening " or
" being " with " knowing that one is." Even so cautious
an interpretation may, however, be doubted. But in the
case of Vel we have a further proof to serve as check.
More than a year later we saw Vel again to question him
on various physical problems. Naturally, we did not
recall to him the questions of the previous year which he
had completely forgotten. The following is his spontaneous
reaction at the age of 9^ : —

We hung a metal box from a double string and placed
it in front of Vel, in such a way that, on letting go of the

176 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

box, the string unwound making the box turn round and
round. " Why does it turn ? — Because the string is twisted.
— Why does the string turn too ? — Because it wants to
unwind itself. — Why ? — Because it wants to he unwound
( = it wants to resume its original position, in which the
string was unwound) . — Does the string know it is twisted ?
— Yes. — Why ? — Because it wants to untwist itself, it knows
it's twisted ! — Does it really know it is twisted ? — Yes. I am
not sure. — How do you think it knows ? — Because it feels
it is all twisted."

The child who speaks thus is neither under the influ-
ence of suggestion nor romancing. The following are
further examples : —

Kenn (7I) : "If you pricked this stone, would it feel
it ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it is hard. — If you put
it in the fire, would it feel it ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because
it would get burnt. — Can it feel the cold or not ? — Yes. —
Can a boat feel it is on the water ? — Yes. — Why ? —
Because it is heavy when you are on it ( = it feels the weight
of the people on board). — Does water feel if you prick it ?
— No. — Why not? — Because it is thin ( = not soUd). —
Does it feel the heat of the fire or doesn't it feel anything ?
— Yes (it feels it). — Would the sun feel it if some one pricked
it ? — Yes, because it is big." " Does the grass feel when
you prick it ? — Yes, because you pull it." " If this table
were carried to the other end of the room, would it feel
it ? — No, because it is light ( = it would offer no resistance,
because it weighs so little). — If some one broke it ? — It
would feel that."

Kenn clearly supposes that the degree of conscious-
ness a thing possesses is in accordance with the effort it
makes ; a boat feels its passengers, but a hght table
does not feel when it is carried and grass feels when it is
picked, etc.

JuiLL (7 J) : A stone feels neither heat nor cold. " Would
it feel if it was dropped on the ground ? — Yes. — Why ? —
Because it would break." " Can a table feel anything ? —
jVo. — Would it feel if it were broken ? — Oh, yes." " Does
the wind feel when it blows against a house ? — Yes. —
Does it feel it or not ? — It feels it. — Why ? — Because it is
in its way. It can't pass. It can't go any further." " Tell

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 177

me some things which don't feel anything. . . . Do
walls feel ? — No. — Why not ? — Because they can't move
(this answer announces the second stage), — Would they
feel anything if they were knocked down ? — Yes. — Does
the wall know it is in a house ? — No. — Does it know it's
tall ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it goes right up, it knows it
goes right up I "

Reyb (8 ; 7) : " Can water feel anything ? — No. — Why
not ? — Because water isn't all one (is Uquid). — If it's put
on the stove, does it feel the heat ? — Yes. — Why ? —
Because the water is cold and the fire is hot. — Does wood
feel anything ? — No. — Does it feel or not when it bums ?
Yes, because it can't stop it (!) — Then it feels or not ? —
It feels."

AU these cases are similar and are free from all taint of
suggestion. They show, all of them, the exercise of differ-
entiation. The child endows all things with consciousness
but not with, consciousness of everything. For example,
he refuses to admit that a stone can feel a prick, that the
sun knows how many people are in the room, that buttons
or spectacles know where they are, etc. But on the con-
trary, as soon as there is any sort of activity or more
especially resistance, there is consciousness ; thus for
Kenn a boat knows when it carries a cargo but a table
does not know it is being carried ; for Juill the wind feels
the presence of an obstacle, but a table feels nothing unless
it is broken, for Reyb wood feels it is burning " because
it can't do anything to stop it," etc. Such cases are easily
interpreted. It is wrong to say the child attributes con-
sciousness to things or at any rate such an expression must
only be regarded as metaphorical. As a matter of fact,
he has never or but very seldom considered the question
as to whether things are conscious or not (he may some-
times do so, however ; see Language and Thought, p. 202) .
But having no notion of a possible distinction between
thought and physical objects, he does not realise that
there can be actions unaccompanied by consciousness.
Activity is for him necessarily purposive and conscious.
A wall cannot be knocked down without feehng it, a
stone cannot be broken without knowing it, a boat cannot

178 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

carry a cargo without effort, etc. There is here a primi-
tive failure to dissociate between action and conscious
effort. The real problem is thus to know how the child
comes to conceive an unconsious action and to dissociate
the notion of the action from that of consciousness of the
action, rather than to know why action and consciousness
appear necessarily connected.

If a parallel be sought among the answers and beliefs
of primitives, it is not to animism with its highly emotional
colouring, such as is manifest in social rites, that we shall
turn, but rather to the httle that is known of primitive
physics. Mach relates in this connection the story of the
Indian chief Chuar, who explained why his men could not
succeed in throwing a stone across a ravine by saying that
the stone was attracted by the ravine, just as we our-
selves might be when suffering from giddiness, and it
thus lost the strength necessary to make it reach the
other side.i Mach further remarks that it is a persistent
tendency in primitive thought to regard every subjective
sensation as universal.

Our interpretation involves, however, yet another diffi-
culty. It may be questioned whether the answers just
analysed are really primitive and constitute the first
stage in child animism. In fact, between the ages of 5
and 6 we found some exceptional cases who were in the
later stages and also we came on children of 4 and 5 who
showed hardly any animist tendency.

GoNT (4), for example, answered thus : " Does the sun
know that you are here ? — Yes. — Does it know you are
in the room ? — It doesn't know anything at all. — Does it
know when it's time to set ? — Oh, of course ! — Does it
know when it's night ? — Oh, no ! " etc.

But in analysing these answers, allowance having been
made for the difficulties involved in setting such questions
to children of this age (and with the present technique
they are certainly considerable), it will be seen that the
child's resistance is usually a matter of words. For the

^ Mach, La Connaissance et I'Erreur, trad Dufour, p 126.

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 179

youngest children the terms " knowing " and " feehng "
are not properly understood and have a more restricted
sense than for older children. " Knowing " means some-
thing hke " having learnt," or " knowing hke a grown-
up." For this reason Gont refuses to allow " knowing"
to a bench, because " the bench isn't a person "(un mon-
sieur). In the same way " feeling " means " being hurt "
or " crying," etc. Children as young as this have prob-
ably no word to express " being aware of." It is thus
that arise the various anomalies which their answers
reveal at this age.

We may, therefore, admit that the answers in the first
category really characterise a first stage. During this
stage all objects may be conscious, even if stationary, but
consciousness is connected with an activity of some kind,
whether this activity arises in the objects themselves or
is imposed on them from without. The stage lasts on an
average until the ages of 6 or 7.

§ 2. The Second Stage : Things that can move
ARE Conscious. — Already in the first stage, the child
regarded consciousness as bound up with some movement,
at least in so far as activity involves movement, but there
was no distinction as to what objects could be conscious ;
a wall, a mountain, etc., were all in this respect the same.
The characteristic of the second stage is, on the contrary,
that consciousness is henceforth restricted to things that
can move, that is to say no longer to objects, which can
for the moment become the seat of a particular movement,
but to those ordinarily in motion or whose special function
is to be in motion. Thus the sun and moon, the stars,
clouds, rivers, the wind, carts, fire, etc., are all regarded
as conscious.

Mont (7 ; o) : " Does the sun know it gives light ? — Yes.
— Why ? — Because it is made of fire. — Does it know that
we are here ? — No. — Does it know it is fine weather ? —
Yes." So, too, the wind, the clouds, the rivers, the rain
are regarded as conscious. " Does the wind feel anything
when it blows against a house ? — Yes, it feels it can't go

i8o CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

any further." " Does a bicycle know when it is going ? —
Yes. — Does it know it is going quickly ? — Yes. — Can it
go by itself ? — No," etc. On the contrary, benches, walls,
stones, flowers, etc., can neither know nor feel. " Does
this bench know it is in this room ? — No. — Why not ? —
It can't speak. — Does it know you are sitting on it ? —
No. — Why not ? — . . . — Would it know if you hit it or
broke it ? — No" etc.

Mont's choice is quite clear, although he himself does
not give the reasons. In the following cases, the children
are more explicit : —

Kae (ii) spontaneously unites consciousness with move-
ment : " Does the sun know anything ? — Yes, it heats. —
Does it know that it's hidden from us in the evening ? —
Yes, because it sees the clouds in front of it . . . no, it
doesn't know, because it isn't it that hides. It's the clouds
that go in front of it." Thus, if the sun hid itself, it would
know, but since it is hidden without having done any-
thing itself, it doesn't know. " Does a bicycle know when
it goes ? — Yes, it feels the ground." " Does a motor know
it goes ? — Yes, it feels it isn't still in the same place."

VoG (8 ; 6) : " Does the moon know it shines ? — Yes.
— ^Why ? — Because it shows us the way at night (the moon
follows us ; see Chapter VII, § 2). — Does the wind know it
blows ? — Yes, because it makes a lot of wind. — Does a
bicycle know when it's going ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because
it can go fast." But stones, etc., neither know nor feel
anything.

Pug (7 ; 2) : " Does the sun know when it sets ? —
Yes. — Does it know it gives light ? — No. — Why not ? —
Because it hasn't any eyes, it can't feel it." " Does a bicycle
know anything ? — No. — Why not ? — / meant it knows
when it goes fast and when it goes slowly. — Why do you
think it knows ? — / don't know, but I think it knows. —
Does a motor know when it's going ? — Yes. — Is it alive ?
— No, but it knows. — Is it the driver who knows or the
motor ? — The driver. — And the motor ? — It knows too."
Benches, tables, stones, walks, etc., neither feel nor know
anything.

Sart (12^) : " Can water feel anything ? — Yes. — What ?
— When there's a wind, it makes waves. Because the wind
makes the waves come, then the water feels something like
that." Stones, walls, tables, etc., feel nothing at all.

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS i8i

" Does a watch know anything ? — Yes, because it tells us
the time. — Why does it know ? — Because it's the hands
which show us the time," etc. (!)

It is unnecessary to multiply these examples, firstly
because they are all alike, but principally because this
stage is essentially one of transition. In fact, children
either attribute consciousness to everything or they re-
strict it to things which move, as if all movement implied
voluntary effort. But they soon realise that the move-
ment of certain things, such as that of a bicycle, comes
entirely from outside, from the man pedalling, for example.
As soon as this distinction is made, the child restricts
consciousness to things that can move of their own accord,
and thus reaches the third stage.

There is thus only a difference of degree between the
second and third stages. To express this difference it
is wrong, despite appearances, to say that the child begins
by attributing consciousness to all things that move
(second stage) and then restricts it to those bodies that
move of their own accord (third stage)-. In reality during
both stages the child regards consciousness as being a
quality of things that move of their own accord, and,
when he attributes consciousness to bicycles in the second
stage, it is in the majority of cases because he conceives
bicycles as endowed with a certain purposive force in-
dependent of the cyclist. 1 The difference between the
second and third stage is simply this that the child
discovers the existence of bodies whose movement is not
self -governed. This discovery leads him to distinguish
two types of body and thus progressively to reduce the
number of bodies that can move of their own accord.
Machines are the first objects to be thus differentiated
from Uving and conscious bodies. Then usually follow
the clouds, streams, etc.

What has just been stated as following from the results
obtained by using the present technique, is confirmed in

^ The reason for this is further dealt with in a special study of
explanations concerning the bicycle (CausaliU Physique, Sect. IV).

i82 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the sequel to this work by means of a much surer technique
employed to study the cause of movement. We shall see
that, in the primitive stages, the child regards all move-
ment as due in part to an external activity but also as
necessarily due to an internal activity, that is to say to
a spontaneous, purposive force. It is not tiU late (after
the ages of 7 and 8) that this animistic dynamism gives
place to a mechanical explanation of movement, even
with regard to machines. This inquiry into movement,
made on children, other than those whose answers are
analysed here, forms the best corroborative proof we have
found to check the value of the present results.

Finally, it must be mentioned that the second stage
extends on an average from the ages of 6-7 to 8-9 and
the third from 8-9 to 11-12.

§ 3. The Third Stage : Things that can move of
THEIR OWN ACCORD ARE CONSCIOUS. — This Stage is the
most systematic and the most interesting of the four.
In the majority of cases the animism is more reflective
and the motive clearer than in the answers of the preceding
stages, which, indeed, showed much more a general trend
of mind than any systematic beliefs. According to the
terminology adopted they were " liberated " rather than
" spontaneous " convictions. On the other hand, many
children of the third stage (not the majority, but a con-
siderable number) show a more reflective view and to-
gether with many " Hberated " convictions are a number
that are " spontaneous."

Ross (9 ; 9) started by ascribing consciousness to
animals but refusing it to the table : " Would a table
feel if I were to prick it ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it
is not a person. — Can the fire feel anything ? — No. — If
someone threw water on it, would it feel that ? — No. —
Why not ? — Because it is not a person. — Does the wind
feel anything when the sun is shining ? — Yes. — Doesn't
it know it is blowing ? — Yes. — Does the sun feel anything ?
— Yes. — What does it feel ? — It feels it's heating, etc."
Ross Ukewise attributes consciousness to the stars, the
moon, the rain and streams, but refuses it to bicycles,

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 183

motors and boats. " Are you sure of all this or not very ?
— Not very. — Have you thought about it before ? — No. —
Why aren't you very sure ? — I haven't learnt it. — You
say the wind feels something, but you aren't quite sure.
Tell me what you think, what makes you think that
perhaps the wind doesn't feel when it is blowing ? —
Because it is not a person. — And why do you think perhaps
it does feel ? — Because it is it (!) that blows " {cp. this
answer with Mart (8 ; 10) ; see Chapter II, § 2): "The
lake knows its name ? — Yes, because it moves. — It knows
it moves ? — Yes, because it's it that moves " (see all Mart's
answers) .

These words " it is it that blows," or " it's it that
moves " contain what is most vital in the third stage
and, therefore, the essence of child animism in its purest
form. The first phrase is all the more striking from being
spoken by one who is "not very sure " of what he is
stating and fully realises that the wind is " not a person."
But since no external cause makes the wind blow, there-
fore it must do so of its own accord and must be aware
of its movement. " Can the wind do what it likes ? " we
then asked Ross : " Can it stop blowing if it wants to ? —
Yes ? — And can it blow whenever it wants to ? — Yes."
Surely then the wind must be conscious ? Ross, it is true,
was not certain, but it is precisely his uncertainty which
is so valuable in laying bare the motives of his thought.

Card (9^) attributes consciousness to the sun, the moon,
and the clouds, but refuses it to stones, etc., and even
to the wind : " Does the wind know when it blows ?
— No. — Why not ? — Because it is the cloud that makes it
blow." This is the spontaneous expression of one of the
numerous explanations children give as to the origin of
the wind, namely, that it is produced by the movement
of the clouds (see La Causalite Physique). The theory
does not, however, concern us at present. The point is
simply that since Card does not regard the wind's move-
ments as spontaneous, he does not attribute consciousness
to it.

ScHi (6, advanced) : "Do the clouds feel that they
are moving ? — They can feel because ifs they that make the
wind." This is Card's theory again and the same argu-

i84 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

ment. Schi also speaks thus concerning flowers : " Do
they know when you tread on them ? — They ought to
know," and then explains : " They must he alive, because
they grow."

Ratt (8 ; lo) resists all suggestion concerning stones,
walls, tables, mountains, machines, etc., but attributes
consciousness to the sun, the wind, etc. : " Does the sun
feel when it's hot ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it's the sun
that makes it hot. — Do clouds feel anything ? — They feel
the sky. — Why ? — Because they touch the sky. — Does the
wind feel cold ? — Yes, because it's it that makes it cold."
Ratt thus distinguishes the spontaneous activity of the
sun and the wind from the non-spontaneous movement
of machines.

Tacc (io ; 6) makes a very clear distinction between
feeling warm and being warm (" avoir chaud " and
etre chaud) : " Does the fire feel warm ? — No. — Why
not ? — Because it is already warm. — Can it ever feel
warmth ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it isn't alive. — Can
it feel warm ? — No, because it is already warm." But
directly he turns to the sun, the clouds, the streams, the
wind he conceives consciousness as bound up with move-
ment : " Are the clouds warm ? — When there is sun. —
Are they warm or do they feel warm ? — They feel warm."
When we undeceived Tacc he rephed : " / thought they
were alive because they move." But he does not regard
consciousness and hfe as entirely coinciding : " Do the
streams feel warm or are they warm when the sun heats
them ? — They feel warm . . . they don't feel much, because
they aren't alive. — Why not ? — They feel a tiny bit because
they are flowing."

The connection between consciousness and spontaneous
movement could not be stated more clearly. Tacc, who
is aged io| knows exactly what degree of consciousness
to apportion to everything and for what reason. He
refuses consciousness to things that have been made,
to fire and rain, but he allows it to the sun, the wind,
the clouds and the streams.

Imh (6, advanced) attributes consciousness to the sun,
the clouds, etc., but refuses it to water, because water
cannot move of its own accord : "It can flow faster, but
only when it's sloping." Imh thus belongs to an advanced

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 185

stage (the third ; see Causalite Physique) as regards the
explanation of the movement of rivers.

Wirt (8 ; 4) : " Could the fire feel if someone pricked
it ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it is alive. — Why is it alive ?
— Because it moves. — Would a cloud feel if someone
pricked it ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it is alive, because it
stays still in the air and then moves when it is windy (the
wind does not always exclude the cloud's moving spon-
taneously; see Causalite Physique). — Can the wind feel
anything ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it blows. — Can the
water feel anything ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it flows."
So, too, with the sun and the moon. " Would grass feel
if . it were pricked ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it's alive,
because it grows." But machines can neither feel nor
know anything : " Does a bicycle know when it goes ? —
jVo. — Why not ? — It isn't alive. — Why not ? — Because
it has to be made to go." So, too, with motors, trains,
carts, etc.

AU these examples are clearly similar, although some
were observed at Geneva, others in the Bernese Jura,
etc. Certainly these children differ from one to another
as to what they regard as a spontaneous movement.
Some consider that fire acts of its own accord, since it
burns all alone once it is ht ; others treat it as an induced
activity since it has to be lit. For some, streams are free
agents, for others the slope plays a purely mechanical
part, etc. In studying the cause of movement it will
be shown that every movement gives rise to one or more
stages during which it is held to be spontaneous, and to
several during which it is held to be determined. Further-
more, these differences of opinion among the children
questioned contain nothing that is not easily explicable.
It is equally interesting to note that all the children
agree in restricting consciousness to bodies that can move
of themselves. This result is all the more striking since
it will be met with again shortly in connection with the
concept of life and quite independent of the present
results.

§ 4. The Fourth Stage : Consciousness is re-
stricted TO Animals. — The best proof that the present

i86 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

technique is sound and that the answers it evokes are
not due to suggestion or fabrication is the existence of
the fourth stage. That children of 9, 8 and even 7 manage
to answer all the questions negatively and to restrict
consciousness to animals alone or to plants and animals
alone, clearly shows that the questions cannot have been
suggestive. Furthermore, it will be seen that there is a
gradual and barely perceptible transition from the answers
of the earlier stages to those of the final stage which is
evidence of the value of the method adopted (see Intro-
duction, § 3).

The fourth stage is not reached on an average before
the ages of 11-12, but several children of 6-7 were found
to belong to it.

The first examples show the continuity between the
third and fourth stages. The following intermediate cases
are especially significant ; consciousness of any sort is
denied to all sublunary objects, with the exception of
animals, but it is still attributed to the sun and the moon
because they move of themselves : —

Pig (9) denies consciousness to the clouds, to fire and
to a flower " because it isn't alive." But the sun is able
to feel : " Why ? — Because it is alive." The stars cannot
feel " because they are just sparks. — And isn't the sun a
spark ? — No, it is a light." The moon also is conscious,
but not the clouds, because they are " made of smoke "
and smoke " can't move " [ne marche pas). " Can the
clouds move by themselves ? — No. — And the moon ? —
Yes." Fire can't feel anything " because you have to make
it," neither can a stream because " it's the air that makes
it move."

GoL (6, very advanced) restricts consciousness to
animals and the moon " because, at night, it always goes
to the same place." Fire, on the other hand, is not con-
scious " because it always stays tn the same place," neither
are clouds because " the wind drives them " {les fait
pousser).

Reh (6|) resists all suggestion concerning clouds, the
wind, water, etc., but claims also that the sun doesn't
feel. " Can the sun feel anything ? — No. — Why not ? —
Because it isn't alive." But when the sun's movements

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 187

are recalled more definitely he shows a latent animism :
" Why does the sun rise ? So that the sun will shine {pour
faire du soleil). — Why? — / don't know. — What does the
sun do when there are clouds and it rains ? — It goes away
because it's bad weather. — Why ? — Because it doesn't want
to be rained on," etc.

It is interesting to note that it is nearly always the
sun and the moon which are the longest to be thought
alive. They are, in fact, the only bodies whose move-
ments seem as spontaneous as those of animals. Reh's
case shows also how animism, even when on the point of
disappearing, merges into finalism. Such a fact shows
in itself what a delicate matter it is to form any general
judgment on child animism. This animism is far from
simple and is as far from common anthropomorphism as
it is from adult mechanism.

The following are genuine examples of the fourth
stage : —

Cel (10 ; 7) denies consciousness even to the sun and
the moon " because it is not alive." " What things can
know and feel ? — Plants, animals, people, insects. — Is
that all ? — Yes. — Can the wind feel ? — No," etc.

Vise (11 ; i) justifies the same standpoint by sajdng
each time : " No (it doesn't feel anything) because it is a
thing, it isn't alive."

Falq (7 ; 3) gives as proof each time the matter of which
the object is made ; thus fire can't feel " because it's burnt
wood," clouds " because they're made of rain," the sun
" because it's made of fire," the moon " because it is a
little cloud " (this is the spontaneous expression of a
conviction to be studied in Chapter IX, § 3), the wind
" because it hasn't got a head," etc.

The concept of " thing " used by Vise is rarely found
before the age of 11, in the sense of an object without
Ufe. Its appearance marks the decline of child animism.

§ 5. Conclusions. — Before continuing the study of
child animism, by proceeding to the analysis of the notion
of " hfe " and that of the moral necessity of natural laws,
the interpretation to be given to the above results must
be stated more definitely.

i88 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

The answers obtained have been classified into four
different stages. It remains now to see whether the
systematisation impHed by these stages really exists in
the child's spontaneous thought, and if the four types
of answer distinguished constitute genuine stages, that is
to say successive types of answer.

As regards the first point, the degree of systematisation
of animist beliefs is evidently much less than a reading
of the above might suppose. In the child, animism is
much more a general trend of mind, a framework into
which explanations are fitted than a consciously systematic
beUef. Two fundamental reasons compel us to reduce to
such proportions the systematisations we have detected.

The first concerns the logical structure of child thought.
Firstly, the child's thought is much less self-conscious
than ours, so that even such implicit systematisations as
were found in the answers of the second stage, for example,
are scarcely recognised by the child himself ; they are
due to an economy of reactions (an economy enforcing
uniformity) much more than to a deliberate eifort to be
coherent. From this arises his inability to give a motive
to his judgments or to justify each individual assertion.
Thus the child in the second stage (life = movement) is
unaware of the motives which make him answer " yes "
or " no " to the various questions. Realisation of the
motive and the ability to justify his answers appears
during the third stage, but still in a rudimentary form.
It is not till the fourth stage that systematisation becomes
reflective rather than impUcit, and it is just at this time
that the child mind discards animism.

It is unnecessary to refer to the contradictions and
difficulties experienced in dealing with elementary logical
operations (addition and multiplication of classes and of
propositions) which go hand in hand with this lack of
reflective systematisation. They have already been
sufficiently dealt with (see Judgment and Reasoning,
Chapter II, §§ 2-4). We need only say that these facts alone
suffice to show why we should not dream of guaranteeing

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 189

the soundness of the present technique as a means of
individual diagnosis. In fact, it may easily happen that
a child who has just attributed consciousness to a parti-
cular object denies it directly after ; a new factor need
only intervene to upset the earlier view and make the
child forget all he has said, contradict himself, change
his beliefs, etc. Care must, therefore, be taken not to
regard any of the examinations as establishing an absolute
individual diagnosis. But this does not prevent the
method having a statistical value, for so long as the
investigation is hmited to studying the general Unes along
which child thought develops, individual fluctuations
compensate each other and the broad lines of the evolu-
tionary process are disclosed.

To these considerations concerning the structure of
thought must be added a second reason showing the
divergence of the obtained results from the child's spon-
taneous thought. To form an idea as to the degree of
systematisation of a belief it is usually sufficient to con-
sider its function. What needs urge the child to take
account of its implicit animism ? There are certainly
only two.

First, according as the child attempts to explain the
unforeseen resistance of some object he fails to make
obey him, he is compelled to regard it as Hving. Or, more
generally, it is when some phenomenon appears doubtful,
strange and above aU frightening that the child credits
it with a purpose. But this need for an explanation
which gives rise to animism is but momentary. As M.
Delacroix puts it : " The sun and moon exist only when
there are ecUpses. The universal does not exist for
primitive man." ^

On the other hand, the child believes in the all-powerful
nature of man's command over things and animism serves
to explain the obedience of things. But this is only an
impHcit tendency and there can be no question of a re-
flective beUef. Only cases of exceptional obedience (such

^ H. Delacroix, La langage et la foi, p. 40.

190 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

as that of the moon which according to Gol " always
goes to the same place ") or of exceptional disobedience
would lead the child to a genuine reflection.

In short, animism must be regarded as resulting either
from an implicit tendency in the child or from its reflection
on exceptional cases. This assertion may justly awaken
doubts firstly as to the stages we have distinguished above
and next as to whether the order of succession traced is
not as artificial as the systematisations characterising
each stage.

Indeed, the scheme we outhned according to which
child animism decreases regularly and logically from the
first to the fourth stage, is too simple not to put us on
our guard. For, why are there no recrudescences of
animism causing the curve of development to fluctuate
and also why is no pre-animist stage to be found ? As a
matter of fact at about the age of 5 children are found who
seem to be much less animist than their elders. More-
over when a child can be studied over a period of several
months the same contradictions are found. Zim, for
example, was in the first stage in March and in the second
the following June. But Vel, on the other hand, was in
the third stage in December 1922, and in the first in June
1923 ! Also, when the same child is watched continuously
and his questions noted and others asked on the subjects
in which he seems most interested, it will be seen that
the animism is always varying and is sometimes more,
sometimes less.

Such contradictions are of as great interest to the
analyst as they are the despair of the statistician. But
without further evidence it would be wrong to conclude
that the above results were valueless, for their internal
convergence, as well as their convergence with all the facts
to be shown in the subsequent portion of this book,
compel us, on the contrary, to accept them in some
measure. The anomalies at whose frequency we have
hinted must, therefore, be open to some explanation.
There are, in fact, three types of factor which tend to upset

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 191

to a certain extent the order of the stages outlined. These
factors are systematisation, conscious awareness and
vocabulary.

The factor of systematisation may be taken to account
for the following. It is usually just when an impHcit con-
viction is about to be shattered that it is for the first
time consciously affirmed. Thus, as John Burnet has
very acutely noted, concerning pre-Socratic thought, a
proposition is seldom stated unless it has first been denied.*
The youngest children are thus animistic, without being
able consciously to justify the tendency. But, directly
the child comes up against a new hypothesis likely to
unsettle it, the first time, for example, that it wonders
whether a marble moves intentionally or mechanically
{Language and Thought, p. 202) it probably adopts the
animistic solution, for lack of a better, and then by
reflection and by systematising extends its meaning be-
yond the hmits which its new and latent tendencies
warrant. Thus thought never progresses in straight lines,
but, so to speak, spirally ; the implicit motiveless con-
viction is succeeded by doubt, and the doubt by a reflective
reaction, but this reflection is itself prompted by new
imphcit tendencies, and so on. This is the explanation
that must be given as to why so many older children
show a more extensive animism than the youngest ;
these children have momentarily found need for this
animism, because they have encountered some pheno-
menon which their thought cannot explain mechanically,
but it is a secondary systematisation which has led them
to these opinions, and the resulting animism is not identical
with but only comparable to that of the younger
children.

The second factor which makes such distortion of
meaning possible is conscious awareness. Since the child
has no clear consciousness of the implicit systematisation
in his mind, it necessarily happens that at the time when
he comes to realise, either as the result of our questions

^ John Burnet, The Dawn oj Greek Philosophy.

192 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

or of a spontaneous reflection, the existence of certain of
his animistic convictions, he will be led to exaggerate
their extent. Thus, when discovering that the clouds
know they move he will credit all moving bodies with
consciousness without realising that he intends only to
attribute it to bodies moving spontaneously. This is that
same difficulty of exclusion or of logical multiplication,
which we have shown elsewhere to be so largely dependent
on factors involving conscious awareness [Judgment and
Reasoning, Chapter IV, § 2). In simpler language, it
means that, in speaking, the child does not succeed —
any more than we do — in expressing his thought really
accurately ; he is continually straining it, through in-
ability to recollect every shade of meaning. This per-
petual lack of adjustment between spoken and implicit
thought makes the child appear when questioned some-
times more and sometimes less animist than he reaUy is.
And the child is himself deceived. This is the second
factor which causes irregularity in the succession of the
stages we distinguished.

Finally, there is vocabulary, which also plays an im-
portant part. The word " to know," for example, cer-
tainly has a narrower meaning to a child of 5 than to one
of 10. To a small child " to know " means " to know
Uke a grown-up," to an older child it simply means " to
be conscious of." In this way words, by altering in mean-
ing, at times impel the child to extend his animism and
at others force him to restrict it.

In conclusion, it is clear how these three factors can
account for the inconstancy in the general development
of child animism. Are we to conclude that the four types
of answer do not constitute stages at all, but that, on
broad lines all that can be said is that the child passes
from an integral animism to one of a more restricted
type ? Obviously not. Each of the children, taken
alone, might possibly show an impUcit systematisation
different from that brought out by our questions, each
is capable, also of retrogressive movements in the series

CONSCIOUSNESS ATTRIBUTED TO THINGS 193

of stages just as much as of progressing in a straight
line, but, on the average, the four types of answer
obtained certainly constitute the types of systematisation
through which the child's spontaneous thought really
passes, and these four types correspond to four stages.

CHAPTER VI
THE CONCEPT OF "LIFE"

It will be of interest to complete the preceding research
by a corresponding study of the ideas children under-
stand by the word " life." There is, indeed, nothing to
show that the concepts of " hfe " and of " consciousness "
are completely synonymous any more than they are to an
adult. But it seems that the idea of " life " is in certain
respects more famiUar to the child than the ideas under-
stood by the words " knowing " and " feehng." It seems
hkely, therefore, that a study of it may reveal clearer
systematisations than those found in the preceding chapter
and that the children's answers wiU all show a higher
development of logical justification and argument. More-
over, if the results of this chapter are found to agree with
those of the preceding, there wiU be a certain guarantee
in this resemblance. We must, therefore, beg the reader
to excuse the repetitions which a study of the concept
of " life " will inevitably involve.

The technique used is very similar to that followed
hitherto. It consists in asking whether each of a number
of objects enumerated is ahve and why. The same pre-
caution must be taken as before to avoid both simple
suggestion and perseveration.

The results obtained have again clearly shown the four
stages previously defined in connection with the attributing
of consciousness to things. During the first stage every-
thing is regarded as living which has activity or a function
or a use of any sort. During the second stage, life is de-
fined by movement, all movement being regarded as in a

194

THE CONCEPT OF " LIFE " 195

certain degree spontaneous. During the third stage, the
child distinguishes spontaneous movement from move-
ment imposed by an outside agent and life is identLSed
with the former. Finally, in the fourth stage, life is
restricted either to animals or to animals and plants.
NaturaUy a child who belongs to a particular stage in the
series will not necessarily belong to the same stage in the
series concerning consciousness (excepting those children
of the second stage who have not yet come to distinguish
spontaneous movement from movement in general). On
the contrary, each child shows a considerable divergence
between the extension it attributes to the two concepts
of life and of consciousness. We do not, therefore, intend
to suggest a correlation between individual cases but
rather a parallelism between the respective processes by
which the notions of " life " and of " consciousness "
are evolved. This is, moreover, of a much greater interest,
since what gives the parallelism its value is the fact
that all suggestion of perseveration is excluded. Such a
parallehsm shows how constant and spontaneous the
child's thought remains notwithstanding the influences
due to its adult environment and the clumsiness of
our questions.

From the point of view of our research, the fact that
the child's notion of Hfe is more systematised than its
notion of consciousness, carries also certain disadvan-
tages. The child will add to its spontaneous ideas various
adventitious definitions (to live is to speak, or to be
warm, or to have blood, etc.). But all the children who
gave these secondary definitions were also able to give
the usual answers, all being simply juxtaposed together,
so that it was possible to neglect these various secondary
notions, whose completely individual character clearly
showed them to be the result of chance conversations
overheard, etc.

Further, according to the lengths to which the system-
atisation of the concept has been carried by the individual
child, retrogressive steps in his development from stage

196 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

to stage occur, comparable to those described in the study
of the notion of consciousness, which make certain cases
particularly hard to classify. But, apart from these two
disadvantages, the inquiry proved easier to undertake
than that described in the last chapter.

§ I. The First Stage : Life is assimilated to
Activity in General. — Despite a certain diversity, the
answers of the first stage all rested on a common basis,
which lay in defining life in terms of activity, and what
was especially interesting, in terms of an activity in
most cases useful to man and always clearly anthropo-
centric.

Vel (8|) : " Is the sun alive 7— Yes.— Why 7— It gives
light. — Is a candle alive ? — No. — Why not ? — (Yes) because
it gives light. It is alive when it is giving light, but it isn't
alive when it is not giving light. — Is a bicycle alive ? — No,
when it doesn't go it isn't alive. When it goes it is alive. —
Is a mountain alive ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it
doesn't do anything (!) — Is a tree alive ? — No ; when it has
fruit it's alive. When it hasn't any, it isn't alive." " Is a
watch alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it goes. — Is a
bench alive ? — No, it's only for sitting on. — Is an oven
alive ? — Yes, it cooks the dinner and the tea and the supper.
— Is a gun aUve ? — Yes, it shoots. — Is the play-bell alive ?
— Yes, it rings." Vel even goes so far as to say that poison
is aUve " because it can kill us."

Tann (8) : " Is a window-pane alive ? — It's as if it was
alive, but it's not like us. The pane stops the air coming in,
but it can't move. — Is it ahve or not ? — It's alive . , ."
" Is a stone alive ? . . , (It's ahve) if you throw it, or if
you kick it to make it go." " Is a cloud alive ? — Yes, it's
living, and when it comes down in rain it goes back again."
To elucidate Tann's meaning we used the following pro-
cedure, which though very artificial is excellent for
determining the child's natural trend of mind : " Which
is more alive, a stone or a lizard ? — A lizard, because a
stone can't move. — The sun or a stone ? — The sun because
it does something, but a stone isn't much use. — A fly or a
cloud ? — A fly because it's an animal, a cloud is a thing. —
What is an animal ? — Something that's not like us. It's
useful. A horse is useful. It can't go to school. It isn't
like us. — Which is more ahve, rain or fire ? — Rain. — Why ?

THE CONCEPT OF " LIFE " 197

— Rain is stronger than Jire, because it can put out fire, hut
fire can't light rain."

Reyb (8 ; 7) : " Are you alive ? — Yes, because I'm not
dead. — Is a fly alive ? — Yes, because it's not dead. — Is the
sun alive ? — Yes because it makes it daytime. — Is a candle
alive ? — Yes, because you can light it. — Is the wind alive ?
— Yes, because it makes it cold, it makes people cold. —
Are clouds alive ? — Yes, because they make it rain," etc.

Per (ii ; 7) : " Is thunder alive ? — / don't think so. —
Why not ? — It isn't like other things, people or trees or
things like that. — Is lightning alive ? — No. — Why not ? —
It isn't any use (!) — What is a hving thing ? — A man who
is alive. — Is the sun aUve ? — Yes. — Why ? — It gives us
light. — Is fire aUve ? — Yes, it's used for lots of things," etc.

It is evident what meaning these children give to the
word " aUve." It means "to do something," or for
choice "to be able to move " (Vel, Tann ; a mountain
can't do anything, a bench is " only for sitting on"), but it
also means to act without changing position, the oven,
the candle, etc., are ahve. Even such an idea as that of
the nature of an animal is defined in tenns of utihty
(Tann). At other times to be alive means simply to have
force ; thus poison, rain, etc. are aUve.

Some of these children give life the same significance
as consciousness (thus Vel and Reyb are also in the first
stage as regards the attributing of consciousness to things).
Others, however, give life a much wider meaning (for
example, Tann and Per, who are in the third stage when
the questions concern consciousness).

Despite these differences, however, the answers of this
first stage have all a common basis which lies in asserting
the idea of a fundamental final cause in nature and a
continuum of forces destined to bring about these ends.
This idea is certainly not peculiar to the answers obtained
by means of the present technique, but appears to be one
of the most fundamental ideas in child thought. This
first stage lasts in fact up to the ages of 6 or 7, and it is
well known that at this age the nature of children's
definitions bears out in a striking manner what we have

198 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

just found. According to Binet and many others, children
of about the age of 6 define an object by " its use " and not
by genus and the specific difference between one genus
and another. Thus a mountain is "to climb up " or "to
shut in " {i.e. to hmit the horizon), a country is "to travel
in," the sun is " to warm us " or " to give us light," etc.
{see J lodgment and Rearoning, Chapter IV, § 2). That this
notion of a final cause impUes a creator who has fashioned
everything for a determined end wiU be shown in what
follows later and does not immediately concern us. But
the idea of so complete a determinism implies that every
object is endowed with a particular activity and force
destined to enable it to fulfil its r61e. That is to say,
that if certain objects obstruct the sun on its way (such
as the wind, the clouds, the night, etc.) the sun must
necessarily be gifted with the necessary qualities to
triumph and to succeed notwithstanding in fulfilling its
role in the required time. Final cause implies an efficient
cause in the form of a force immanent in the object and
directing it towards its destined end. To the child's
mind the idea of " life " fulfils this function.

We shall again find in a new form a conclusion already
formed as a result of the study of children's questions
{Language and Thought, Chapter V). The very way in
which a child frames its questions shows that physical
causality is for him still undifferentiated from psychological
and purposive association. It is a case of " precausality."
It will be clearly seen how near this concept approaches
the notion of " life " examined above, life being regarded
as a force that is both material and purposive. Children's
" whys " are, therefore, at bottom a search for a biological
explanation : " Why does the Rhone go so fast ? " is in
fact the same order of question as " Why does that ant
go so fast ? " it being taken for granted that every animal
whilst moving of its own accord is, as stated by Tann,
" useful " to man.

Is such an idea primitive or derived ? In other words
is it already present in children of 3 or 4, that is to say in

THE CONCEPT OF " LIFE " 199

children too young to be able to answer our questions,
since not yet knowing the word " life " ? It seems that
it is. At least this is what a study of the language and
behaviour of children of this age seems to suggest. At
aU events, everything appears to suggest that as soon as
the appearance of the word " life " gives rise to a system-
atisation of the corresponding concept, the form of this
concept is from the first that which was found in the stage
studied above.

§ 2. The Second Stage : Life is assimilated to
Movement. — As was the case for the corresponding stage
in the series dealing with consciousness, so this stage is
also one of transition above all. We obtained, however,
quite enough clearly-defined examples to shield ourselves
from the reproach of adding another stage which, hke a
false window, serves no purpose but merely lends sym-
metry to the edifice.

ZiMM (7 ; 9 and 8 ; i) was questioned in March and
June of the same year. In March he was intermediate
between the first and second stages. In June he clearly
defined hfe in terms of movement in general : —

In March : " You know what it is to ' be alive ' ? —
It's when you can do things (this definition seems as if
belonging to the first stage, but, as we shall see, Zimm is
thinking principally of movement). — Is a cat alive ? — Yes.
— A snail ? — Yes. — A table ?—No. — Why not ? — It can't
move. — Is a bicycle alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — It can go. —
Is a cloud ahve ? — Yes. — Why ? — // sometimes moves. —
Is water alive ? — Yes, it moves. — Is it alive when it doesn't
move ? — Yes. — Is a bicycle ahve when it isn't moving ? —
Yes, it's alive, even when it doesn't move. — Is a lamp alive ?
— Yes, it shines. — Is the moon alive? — Yes, sometimes it
hides behind the mountains."

In June : " Is a stone alive ^ — Yes. — Why ? — // moves
[il marche). — When does it move? — Some days, some-
times.— How does it move ? — By rolling. — Is the table
alive ? — No, it can't move. — Is the Saleve ahve ? — No,
it can't move. — Is the Rhone alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — It
moves. — Is the lake alive ? — Yes, it moves. — Always ?
— Yes. — Is a bicycle alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — It goes [die
marche)," etc.

200 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

JuiLL (7^) : " Is a lizard alive ? — Yes. — A nail ? — No.
— A flower ? — No. — A tree ? — No. — Is the sun alive ? —
Yes. — Why ? — Because it moves when it has to (Parceque
quand il faut (!) il marche). — Are clouds alive ? — Yes,
because they move and then they hit (ils marchent, puis ils
tapent). — What do they hit ? — They make the thunder when
it rains. — Is the moon alive ? — Yes, because it moves (elle
marche). — The fire ? — Yes, because it crackles. — Is the
wind alive ? — Yes, because on a windy day it's cold, it's
alive because it moves (il bouge). — A stream ? — Yes, because
it's always going faster. — A mountain ? — No, because it's
always in the same place (elle reste toujours debout). — A
motor ? — Yes, because it moves," etc.

Kenn (7 1) : "Is water alive }—Yes. — Why ? — It moves
(elle bouge). — Is fire alive ? — Yes, it moves (9a bouge). —
Is the sun alive ? — Yes, it moves (il avance)," etc.

VoG (8:6): " Are you alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — / can
walk and I go and play. — Is a fish ahve ? — Yes, because it
swims." " Is a bicycle alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — // can go.
— Is a cloud ahve ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it can go (il
pent aller). — Is the moon ahve ? — Yes. — Why ? — It guides
us at night."

Cess (8) : " Is a horse aUve ? — Yes. — Is a table alive ?
— No. — Why not ? — Because it's been made." " Is the
moon alive ? — No, because it always stays in the same place.
— Doesn't it ever move ? — Sometimes. — When ? — When you
walk.— Is it ahve or not ? — Alive. — Why ? — When you
walk." "Is the wind alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because it
goes gently and then fast (parce qu'il marche et puis il
court)," etc.

Keut (9 ; 3) answered the question " You know what
it is to be alive ? " straightway by sajang, " Yes to
move (!) "

Gries (9 ; i) answered as follows from the beginning :
" You know what it is to be alive ? — Yes, to be able to move.
— Is the lake ahve ? — Not always. — Why not ? — Some-
times there are waves and sometimes there aren't any."
" Is a cloud alive ? — Yes, it moves as if it were walking
(c'est comme s'il marchait). — Is a bicycle alive ? — Yes, it
goes (elle roule)."

Kaen (11) : " Is a stream alive ? — Yes, it goes (il roule).
— Is the lake alive ? — Yes, it is always moving a bit. — Is
a cloud alive ? — Yes, you can see it moviiig (on le voit
marcher). — Grass ? — Yes, it can grow."

The impression these children give is that the assimila-

THE CONCEPT OF " LIFE " 201

tion of life to movement is evidently simply a matter
of words. That is to say, the word " hfe " means
simply movement, but this movement has none of
the characteristics with which we should define
life, such as spontaneity, purpose, etc. The child says
that a stream is alive just as a physicist would say that
a movement has been " imparted to it," that it " has
acceleration," etc.

We think, however, the matter goes deeper, and that
movement in general is really thought to possess the
characteristics of life. Three sound reasons suggest this
interpretation. The first is that the spontaneous ques-
tions of children prove that the definition of life is a
problem with which they are really concerned and that
the assimilation of hfe to movement has a genuine mean-
ing in their eyes. Thus Del at the age of 6| (see Language
and Thought, p. 197) asks concerning some leaves, " Are
they dead ? — Yes. — But they move with the wind."
The second reason is that this second stage is followed by
one in which the child distinguishes spontaneous move-
ment from movement imparted from without (third
stage). The average ages in fact of children in the
stage under consideration are 6-8, whilst the third stage
lasts on an average from the ages of 8-9 to the ages
of 11-12. But, apart from certain exceptions, it is only
during this later stage that the distinction is made be-
tween spontaneous and imparted movement ; until then
all movement is regarded as spontaneous and the assimila-
tion of life to movement is thus more than a mere matter
of words. The third and final reason is that the whole
study of the child's view of the physical world, to be
undertaken later (see La Causalite Physique), confirms
the reality of this confusion between the mechanical and
the biological.

§ 3. The Third and Fourth Stages : Life is assimi-
lated TO Spontaneous Movement, then later is
restricted to Animals and Plants. — The best proof
of the genuineness of the convictions of the first and

202 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

second stages is the systematisation and persistence of
the ideas now to be studied as characteristic of the third
stage. The assimilation of the idea of hfe to that of
spontaneous movement marks in fact the most important
stage in child animism and the richest in its applications.
For before arriving at any such systematisation, the child
must for a long time have been feehng out in that direction
and have already assimilated the idea of life either to that
of activity in general or to that of movement of whatever
kind.

The following examples are drawn from the most
reflective answers obtained from children of this stage : —

Sart (i2|) : " You know what it means to be aUve ?
— y^s.— Is a fly ahve ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because if it
wasn't alive it couldn't fly." " Is a bicycle alive ? — No. —
Why not ? — Because it's we who make it go. — Is a horse
alive ? — Yes. — Why }^He helps man." " Are clouds
alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — No, they're not. — Why not ? —
Clouds aren't alive. If they were alive they could come and
go as they wanted (ils seraient en voyage). — It's the lejind
that drives them (!) — Is the wind ahve ? — Y^s.— Why ? —
It's alive, because it's the wind that drives the clouds. — Are
streams alive ? — Yes, because the water is flowing all the
time.- — Is a motor ? — No, it's the engine that makes it go. —
Is the engine alive ? — No, it's man who makes the engine
go. — Is the sun alive ? — Yes, it makes the sunshine and
gives light during the day. — Is the lake alive ? — No, because
the lake is all alone and it can't ever move by itself (il bouge
jamais)."

Fran (15 ; 5) : " Is a worm ahve ? — Yes, it can walk. —
Is a cloud ahve ? — No, the wind drives it. — Is a bicycle
alive }—No, it's we who make them move. — Is the wind
alive ? — No, it goes quickly enough, but it's something else
that drives it (!) (il marche bien, mais c'est autre chose
qui le pousse). — Is fire alive ? — Yes, it can move on its
own (il bouge lui-meme). — Is a stream ? — Yes, it flows all
alone. — Is the wind ahve 7- -Yes. — Just now you said it
wasn't. Which do you mean ? — It's alive. — Why ? — It
can move by itself (il bouge lui-mem(^). — Why ? — // drives
itself (!) (il se pousse lui-meme).-- Is a cloud alive ? — No,
it's the wind that drives it."

Barb (6) is exceedingly clear, despite his age : " Tell

THE CONCEPT OF " LIFE " 203

me some things that are ahve. — Butterflies, elephants,
people, the sun. — The moon ? — Yes, also. — Are stones
ahve ? — No. — Why not ? — / don't know ? — Why ? — Be-
cause they aren't alive. — Are motors ahve ? — No. — Why
not ? — I don't know. — What does it mean to be ahve ? —
To be able to move all alone (!) — Is water ahve ? — No. —
Doesn't it move aU alone ? — Yes." Later on, however,
owing to his age, Barb fell back into the second stage :
" Are stones alive ? — No. — Not when they roU ? — Yes,
when they roll they're alive. When they're still, they're not
alive."

EuG (8^) : " Are clouds ahve ? — No, the wind drives
them. — Is water ahve ? — No, the wind makes it move. — Is
a bicycle ? — No, what makes it go is when you ride on it. —
Which is more alive, the wind or a bicycle ? — The wind, it
can go for as long as it wants to. You make a bicycle stop
sometimes."

Pois (7 ; 2) : " Are clouds alive ? — No, because they
can't move, it's the wind that makes them go." The wind,
the sun and the earth are ahve " because they move (parce
que ^a bouge)."

Nic (10 ; 3) : A cloud is not alive " because it can't move
(marcher). It isn't alive. It's the wind that drives it (qui
le pousse)." The wind, on the other hand, is alive " because
it makes the other things move and it moves itself (il fait
avancer les autres choses et il avance lui-meme)."

Chant (8 ; 11) attributes hfe to the sun and stars, the
clouds, the wind and water " because they can go wherever
they want to," but denies it to the lake " because the lake
can't go from one lake to another," etc.

Mos (11 ; 6) denies life to machines, to water, etc.
" because they can't move (bouger)," but he ascribes it to
fire, to the sun and stars and the clouds " because they
move." Evidently, therefore, be means spontaneous
movement.

It is obvious that owing to the difficulty children
experience in realising what their own thoughts are, the
majority of these cases are less clear than those in the
preceding sections. We have discussed elsewhere [Judg-
ment and Reasoning, Chapter IV, § 2) the cases of Grand,
Schnei, Horn, who belong to this stage yet are unable to
think of a definition of hfe corresponding to the examples
they give.

204 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

It is unnecessary to deal with the fourth stage, during
which Ufe is restricted to animals alone, or to plants and
animals. It appears that three-quarters of the children
do not reach this stage before the ages of 11-12. Until
then the sun and stars and the wind are systematically
endoXved with hfe and consciousness.

The majority of children, in the two last stages, assign
the same meaning to life as to consciousness, but some,
like Sart, give consciousness a wider significance. The
reason for this will be considered in the following section.

§ 4. Conclusion : the Notion of " Life." — The
reader cannot fail to be struck by the remarkable corre-
spondence between the four stages analysed in this
chapter and the four stages into which the answers
dealing with consciousness were classified. Although only
two-fifths of the children belonged to the same stage in
both series, the evolution of the two notions obeys the
same laws and follows the same direction. Undoubtedly,
as has already been pointed out, certain adventitious
ideas arise which unsettle the notions of some of the
children ; yet, although a number of children used such
ideas as being able to speak or having blood, etc., to
define life, not a single case was found (among those who
knew the word naturally) of a child who failed to bring
in also the idea of activity and movement. The schema
outhned may, therefore, be taken as general.

We must now face the problem that confronted us in
dealing with consciousness, as to whether there is direct
progression from one stage to the next or whether there
exist retrogressive movements which set the child back
temporarily in an earlier stage. Evidently it will be the
same in both cases, and the three apparently regressive
factors found in the attributing of consciousness to things
will exist equally in the evolution of the notion of
" life."

What is of greater interest is to define the exact relation-
ship which connects the notion of hfe to that of conscious-
ness ? As regards the signification of the two concepts

THE CONCEPT OF " LIFE " 205

the results were very clear. Two-fifths of the children
questioned were found to be in the same stage in each
series. These two-fifths were more advanced in their
ideas concerning hfe, that is to say, they attributed Ufe
to fewer objects than they did consciousness. Finally,
only one-fifth showed the inverse relationship, that is to
say, regarded objects as living to which they denied
consciousness. In conclusion, therefore, the notion of
consciousness seems to have a wider extension for the
child than the notion of hfe.

This result is particularly striking among the youngest.
That is to say, children who are in the first or second
stage when speaking of consciousness are generally found
to be in a more advanced stage for ideas concerning Ufe.
The elder children, on the contrary, that is to say, those
in the third and fourth stages, are usually in the same
stage in the two parallel series.

Naturally, in arriving at these statistics we took the
necessary precaution of not questioning all the children
in the same order. Some were questioned on hfe before
being questioned on consciousness, others the reverse ;
some were questioned first on knowing or being awaie,
then on hfe, and lastly feeling, etc. All the answers were
examined to see they were not due to perseveration. We,
therefore, feel justified in regarding the results as free
from " systematic errors."

What may be deduced from these facts ? They seem to
point to the conclusion that the evolution of the notion of
Ufe determines the evolution of the notion of conscious-
ness. In other words, it is the child's classification of
things into Uving and not-Uving which guides him in
attributing consciousness to them. There is certainly
no definite reasoning or purpose in this, at any rate so
far as the younger children are concerned, and this ex-
plains the lack of correspondence of the stages between
the two evolutions. But his reflections on " life " accustom
the child to regard the movements of nature as of different
kinds, and this consideration of types {i.e. the type of

2o6 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

spontaneous movement) comes gradually to influence his
ideas on consciousness.

It is evident from this that the explanation of move-
ment is of extreme importance in the thought of the
child. The analysis of this explanation wiU be under-
taken in the sequel to this work {La Causalitd Physique).
For the time being, it need only be said that the extension
of the notion of " life " seems to indicate the presence in
the child's universe of a continuum of free forces endowed
with activity and purpose. Between magical causaUty,
according to which all things revolve around the self and
the dynamism of material forces the notion of hfe forms
an intermediary Hnk. Bom of the idea that all things are
directed towards an end and that this end supposes a free
activity as the means of attaining it, the notion of life
gradually becomes reduced to the idea of force or of being
the cause of spontaneous movement.

CHAPTER VII

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM,
MORAL NECESSITY AND PHYSICAL
DETERMINISM

There are three preliminary problems which must be
discussed before any attempt can be made to trace the
origins of child animism. We shall start by grouping in
a first section such facts as we have been able to arrive
at by pure observation (in opposition to those collected
in answer to questions). Secondly, we shall analyse the
only conviction, both systematic and entirely spontaneous,
revealed by the preceding questions, namely the behef
of children that the sun and moon follow them. Thirdly,
we must examine the type of necessity (moral necessity
and physical determinism) which the child ascribes to
regular movements such as the laws of nature. The study
of the obedience of the sun and moon will serve as intro-
duction, moreover, to this more general research, which is
indispensable to an analysis of the roots of anunism.
We shall then be in a position to conclude with an ex-
planation of the origins of child animism.

§ I, The Child's Spontaneous Animism. — Books on
psychology and pedagogy abound in examples of traces
of animism shown by children. It would be tedious to
quote them all, nor is it necessary since they are not all
of equal value. Animism during play (such as the endow-
ing of personality to dolls) forms in particular a special
problem which we shall not treat here

We shall start by giving some adult recollections.
Those of deaf-mutes are particularly important, since they

207

2o8 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

show the affective tonahty which animism may assume
among children who have received no trace of religious
education.

James ^ quotes the case of a deaf-mute, Thomas
d'EsteUa, who became a professor and left an account of
his early recollections. D'Estrella tells how nothing
aroused his curiosity so greatly as the moon. He feared
it yet always loved to watch it. He noted the impression
of a face in the fuU moon and thence supposed it to be a
Uving Being. He then tried to prove whether or not it
was alive. He attempted this in four different ways.
The first was to shake his head from right to left with
his eyes fixed on the moon. It seemed to him that the
moon followed the movements of his head down and up
and from side to side. He thought, too, that the lights
were alive for he made the same experiments with them.
When he went for a walk he would look to see if the moon
was following him and it seemed to do so wherever he
went. (For his further reasons for beheving the moon to
be alive see Chapter IV, § 2.)

Another deaf-mute studied by James ^ spoke of regarding
the sun and moon " with a sort of reverence " because
of their powers of lighting and heating the earth. Later
he teUs how his mother talked to him of a Being up there,
pointing with her finger to the sky with a solemn look,
and how in his anxiety to know more he overwhelmed her
with questions to know whether she meant the sun, the
moon or the stars.^

In the memories of normal children, animism has
naturally quite a different affective tonality. Cases such
as the following, for example, are not at aU uncommon : —

One of us recalls having set herself the following obliga-
tions as a child. If by chance she displaced a stone that
had been partially buried in the ground, she put it back

^ William James, " Thought before Language," Philosophical Review I,
(1892). pp. 613-624.

^ Principles of Psychology, I, p. 266.

' See also Pratt, Psychology of Religious Belief.

In Sintenis' Pisleron (Leipzig, 1800) occurs a very curious account
of the formation of an animist belief concerning the sun. Bovet gives
a summary of it in Le Sentiment religieux et la psychologic de I'Enfant,
Delachaux et Niestl6, 1925.

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 209

in its place so that it should not suffer from having been
moved. Or again, if she brought home a flower, or a
pebble she always brought several flowers or pebbles at
the same time so that they should have company and not
feel lonely.

Another felt compelled, on the other hand, to move
stones from the path every now and then so that they
wouldn't always have exactly the same view to look at.

This last recolJection entirely agrees with that of Miss
Ingelow related by Sully. ^

But let us leave these recollections and consider some
remarks and questions furnished by direct observation.
It has often been noticed how frequently children's
questions betray an animistic point of view, and that what
usually prompts them to ask such questions is the observa-
tion of movement. Stanley Hall, in particular, has
confirmed Sully's statement that the child's questions
result from his having assimilated life to movement. ^ He
also observed that even those children who have acquired
the idea of God endow things with intense powers of
organisation.^ For example, Stanley HaU collected the
following questions concerning the wind : —

A boy of 6 years asked what made the wind blow.
Was somebody pushing it ? He thought it ought to stop
when it came up against a house or a big tree. He asked
also if it knew that it was making the pages of his book
turn over.

This same question is found with other children of the
same age concerning moving objects : —

Del at the age of 6| saw a marble rolling in the direction
of Mile V. on a sloping surface : " What makes it go ? — It's
because the ground isn't flat, it slopes, it goes downhill. —
Does it (the marble) know that you're there?" [Language
and Thought, p. 202.)

At the same age we collected also conversations of the
following type : —

^ Sully, Studies of Childhood, p. 31. See also pp. 94-96, in which

Sully records observations of children attributing life to smoke and
fire, to the wind and even to machines.

* Pedagogical Seminary. 1903, p. 335. * Ibid., p. 333.

210 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Lev. (6) watching what Hei (6) is doing : " Two moons.
— No, two suns. — Suns aren't like that with a mouth. They
are like the real suns up there. — They're round. — Yes,
they're quite round, hut they haven't got eyes and a mouth. —
Yes they have, they can see. — No, they can't. It's only God
who can see." {Language and Thought, p. 24.)

Rasmussen (i) noted in his daughter at the age of four
the behef that the moon follows us, a conviction we have
already noted frequently and which wiU be studied
systematically in the next section : —

R (aged 4) seeing the moon : " There's the moon, it's
round. . . . It goes on when we go on." Later, when the
moon was hidden behind a cloud : " Look, now it's been
killed." R was told that the moon is not really moving at
all and that it only seems as if it is. But three da3's later
she said : " Every now and then the moon disappears ; perhaps
it goes to see the ram in the clouds, or perhaps it's cold."

Questions of children of the ages of 5, 6 and 7 are also
very often concerned with death, and show their attempts
to find a definition of life. In Chapter VI (§ 2) we
recalled Del's question {Are those leaves dead .^ — Yes. —
But they move with the wind /) which points clearly to the
assimilation of the ideas of life and movement.

The animism of younger children is much more implicit
and unformulated. They do not question whether things
know what they are doing, nor whether things are alive
or dead, since on no point has their animism yet been
shaken. They simply talk about things in the terms used
for human beings, thus endowing them with will, desire,
and conscious activity. But the important question in
each case is to know just up to what point they really
beheve in these expressions or to what extent they are
merely a matter of words. But it is impossible to question
them on this. The only method of gaining an insight is
careful observation, both of the child's behaviour and of
his words. The following, for example, is the case of a
little girl who one morning found the eyes of her doll had
disappeared (fallen into the inside of the head). Despair
and tears ! She was then promised that the doll should

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 211

be taken back to the shop to be mended, and for the next
three days she was continually asking with the most
obvious anxiety whether the doll was still bad and if it
hurt her to be mended.

But in the majority of cases, the child's behaviour is
not nearly so instructive. The best method when a par-
ticular expression appears to be prompted by animism, is
to study, by comparison with other remarks of the same
child, the exact use it makes of this expression. The
following is an example of the method, appUed to the use
of the interrogative " who " (" qui and qui est-ce que ").
This use of the word " who " (^qui ") to describe things
as if the}^ were people is indeed a striking characteristic
of the language of children between the ages of 2 and 3.
Is it a question of animism or of verbal economy ?

Nel (2 ; 9) knows the word " what " (" qu'est-ce que ")
as she uses it in such expressions as " what's thai ? {qu'est-ce
c'est la) " — pointing to a dustbin ; " what's that over there,
boxes ? " — pointing to some cardboard boxes ; " what are
you doing there ? " The same form was used also when
referring to a heap of plates, a stone, a rowan-tree, a field,
a dried -up spring, a tree-trunk, moss, blackberries, a
drawing. The objects thus designed are all, it will be
noticed, motionless. Nel uses the word " who " (qui) ^ (i) for
people : " who is that playing music ? " " who gave that ? "
(a chalk). (2) For animals : cows, dog, etc. She asked
the question " who is that calling ? " about hens, thrushes,
starlings, crows, owls, etc., both when they were in full
view and when she could not see them. In front of a
grasshopper she said : " Hallo, Grasshopper, who are you ? "
(3) To trains: Who's that?" (4) To boats: "Who's
that?" (this to a large boat she saw on the lake and
which was unlike the steamers she knew). (5) To mechani-
cal noises: "Who is making thai noise?" (a motor).
" Who is making that hanging? " (a gun). " Who is making
that sound ? " (the same). It is true that in the last examples
Nel may perhaps only mean who is shooting or who is

^ In French ' qui " is the equivalent of the interrogative " who "
and " qu'est-ce que " of " what " " Who " is therefore more easily
said than " what." The mistake appears to be much less common in
English. [Translator's note.]

212 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

driving the motor, etc. But this explanation does not
seem to fit all the cases. (6) To water : " Who has made
it dirty? Is it the ram who's made the fire-place dirty?"
(7) To some smooth round pebbles : " Who's that ? Who
is it that I've spat on?"

It seems, therefore, that Nel uses " who " for all objects
that move and that in this she is attributing life to such
objects. Moreover we have found " who " used in speaking
of the Rhone and the lake up to the age of 7. This use
of " who " certainly proves nothing by itself. But, as
remains to be shown, moving bodies inspire innumerable
animistic expressions in very young children, the cumu-
lative effect of which is certainly to suggest a tendency of
mind rather than a mere metaphorical manner of speaking.

Cli (3 ; 9) speaking of a motor in a garage : " The
motor's gone to bye-byes. It doesn't go out because of the ram
[elle fait dodo, elle sort pas . . . )."

Bad (3) : " The bells have woken up, haven't they ? "

Nel (2 ; 9) seeing a hollow chestnut tree : " Didn't it
cry when the hole was made ? " To a stone : " Not to touch
my garden! . . . My garden wo.ild cry." Nel, after throw-
ing a stone on to a sloping bank watching the stone rolling
down said : " Look at the stone. It's afraid of the grass."

Nel scratched herself against a wall. Looking at her
hand : " Who made that mark ? ... It hurts where the
wall hit me."

Dar (i ; 8 to 2 ; 5) bringing his toy motor to the window :
" Motor see the snow." One evening a picture (of some
people he knew) fell to the ground. Dar stood up in bed,
crying and calling out : " The mummies (the ladies) all
on the ground, hurt!" Dar was watching the grey clouds.
He was told that it was going to rain : " Oh, look at the
wind ! — Naughty wind, smack wind. — Do you think that
would hurt the wind ? — Yes." A few days later : " Bad
yi}ind. — No, not naughty — rain naughty. Wind good. —
Why is the rain naughty ? — Because Mummy pushes the
pram and the pram all wet." Dar couldn't go to sleep, so
the light was left on at his demand : " Nice light "
(gentille). On a morning in winter when the sun shone
into the room : " Oh, good! the stm's come to make the
radiator warm."

These last remarks clearly show the child's tendency,

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 213

noted by Sully, to regard natural objects as big children
that are either good or naughty according to their activity.

Each of these examples is obviously debatable. But
the constancy of the style proves at any rate how httle
these children are concerned to distinguish things from
living beings. Anything that moves is described as if it
were conscious and every event as if it were purposive.
" The wall who hit me " thus signifies the child's tendency
to regard all resistance as intentional. The difficulties
involved in the direct analysis of such expressions are
evident. Nevertheless, and this seems the most convincing
argument, these expressions do really seem to arise from
a latent animism since it is not until the ages of 5-7 that
children start asking questions as to how far things are
alive and conscious, while before this age they appear
entirely untroubled by such questions as if their solution
was too obvious to present any problem.

To conclude, we noted two periods in the spontaneous
animism of children. The first, lasting until the ages of
4-5, is characterised by an animism which is both integral
and implicit ; anything may be endowed with both
purpose and conscious activity, according to the occasional
effects on the child's mind of such occurrences as a stone
which refuses to be thrown on to a bank, a wall which can
hurt the hand, etc. But this animism sets no problem to
the child. It is taken for granted. After the ages of 4-6.
however, questions are asked on the subject, showing that
this imphcit animism is about to disappear and con-
sequently that an intellectual systematisation is about to
take place. It is now that it becomes possible to question
the child, and that the stages whose succession was
studied in the two previous chapters are found for the
first time.

§ 2. The Sun and Moon follow us. — The animism
which is shown in the questions and conversation of
children of 5-7 has its origin essentially in the appearance
of chance phenomena which the child cannot understand
by reason of their unexpectedness. But the very fact

214 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

that these phenomena are the only ones to arouse his
interest makes his S])ontaneou5 animism appear very
Hmited. Such is not, however, the case. We shall show
in the following section that he conceives the world as a
society of beings obedient to moral and social laws. There
is therefore no reason why he should ask many questions
revealing animism ; in fact, as we have so often seen
{Language and Thought, Chapter V), it is the exception
which strikes him and which offers him a problem.

If such is the case it ought to be possible to find animist
behefs in the child, which are tacit but none the less
systematic. This is what we shall now try to show by
analy.sing a belief, the study of which will form a transition
between the study of spontaneous animism and the
analysis of the type of necessity which is attributed by
children to natural laws. This belief is that, according
to which the child regards itself as being constantly
followed by the sun and the moon. So far as we can judge
from the verv great number of children we have questioned
at Geneva, Paris and elsewhere, this belief appears to be
extremely general and also very spontaneous. It will also
be remembered that Rasmussen's daughter at the age of 4
and James's deaf-mute both showed it. Numerous spon-
taneous instances of the idea have also already been found
during the course of the questions on animism. The
children whose answers are now given had not already
been questioned on animism, but are new subjects,
questioned specially concerning the sun and the stars, the
causes of movement, etc.

The technique to be followed, in order to eliminate the
influence of suggestion is extremely simple. The child
is questioned as follows : " When you go out for a walk,
what does the sun do ? " If the child has the conviction
that the sun follows him he will answer straightway " it
follows us." If he has not this conviction, the question
is too vague to contain any definite suggestion. The child
will then answer : " it shines, it warms us, etc." The
question may also be asked directly, " does the sun

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 215

move ? " — and this will often be enough to start the child
talking spontaneously.

Three stages were observed. During the first, the child
believes that the sun and moon follow him, just as a bird
might above the roofs. This stage lasts, on an average,
up to the age of 8, but examples are still found up to 12.
During a second stage he admits at the same time both
that the sun does and does not follow. He tries to avoid
the contradiction so far as he can ; the sun does not
move but its rays follow us, or the sun remains in the
same place but turns so that it can always watch us, etc.
The average age of these children is from 8 to 10. Finally,
after lo-ii, on an average, the child knows that the sun
and moon only appear to follow us, and that it is really
an illusion due to their great distance. From the point
of view of animism, which is all that interests us at
present, the two first stages are animist, the third
usually marks the disappearance of animism concerning
the sun. During the first stage, the child completely
and unreservedly endows both the sun and moon with
consciousness and will.

The following are examples of the first stage : —

J AC (6) " Does the sun move ? (these words mark
the beginning of the examination. — We had previously
asked no question of Jac beyond his name and age). — Yes,
ti'Jien one walks, it follows. When one turns round it turns
round too. Doesn't it ever follow you too ? — Why does it
move ? — Because when one walks, it goes too {it marche).
— Why does it go ? — To hear what we say. — It is alive ? —
Of course, otherwise it couldn't follow us, it couldn't shine."
A moment later : " Does the moon move ? — Yes, when one
walks too, more than the sun, because if you run the moon
goes as fast as rmming, but when you run imth the sun it
only goes as fast as walking {quand on court ellc court, et
puis le soleil quand on court, il marche). Because tJie moon
is stronger than the sun, it g'^cs faster. The sun can't ever
catch it up (the illusion is in fact much clearer with the
moon than the sun). — What happens when you don't
walk ? — The moon stops. But when I stand still someone
else starts running. — If you were to run and one of your

2i6 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

friends were to run in the opposite direction at the same
time, what would happen ? — // would go with the other."
At the end of the examination, which was then directed
to the cause of movement in general, we asked : " What
is making the sun move to-day ? — It isn't moving, because
no one is walking. Oh, yes I It must be moving, because I
can hear a cart."

Bov (6 ; 5) : " When you are out for a walk what does
the sun do ? — It comes with me. — And when you go home ?
— It goes with someone else. — In the same direction as
before ? — Or in the opposite direction. — Can it go in any
direction ? — Yes. — Can it go wherever it likes ? — Yes. —
And when two people go in opposite directions ? — There
are lots of suns. — Have you seen the suns ? — Yes, the more
I walk and the more I see, the more there are." A moment
later : " Does the moon move ? — Yes, when I'm out of
doors in the evening and I want to go on the lake, the moon
comes with me. If I want to go in the boat, the moon comes
with me too, like the sun, it comes as well if it is still there."

Cam (6) said of the sun : "It comes with us to look at
us. — Why does it look at us ? — It looks to see if we are
good." The moon comes at night " because there are people
who want to work. — Why does the moon move ? — It's
time to go and work. Then the moon comes. — Why does'
it move ? — Because it's going to work with the men who
work. — Do you believe that ? — Yes. — That it works ? —
// looks to see if they work properly."

Hub (6^) : " What does the sun do when you are out
for a walk ? — It moves. — How ?— 7^ goes with me. — Why ?
— To make it light, so that you can see clearly .—Wov^ does
it go with you ? — Because I look at it. — What makes it
move when it goes with you ? — The wind. — Does the wind
know where you are going ? — Yes. — When I go for a walk
where does the sun go ? — It goes with you (we showed
Hub two people walking in opposite directions). — You see,
if you were to go that way and I this way, what would
the sun do ? — The sun would go with you. — Why ? —
With me . . . ."

Jac (6i) : " What does the moon do when you are out
for a walk ? — It goes with us [elle route avec nous). — Why ?
— Because the wind makes it go. — Does the wind know
where you are going ? — Y^s.— And the moon too ? — Yes.
— Does it move on purpose to go out with you or because
it has to go ? — It comes so as to give us light. — Where did
you go for a walk ? — On the ' Plaine ' (a public walk).

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 217

The moon went too (la lune elle roulait). — Did it see you ?
— Yes. — Does it know when you go for a walk on the
' Plaine ' ? — Yes. — Does it care ? — Yes, it does. — Does it
know your name ? — No. — And mine ? — No. — Does it
know there are houses ? — Yes. — Does it know I wear
glasses ? — No."

Sar (7) : " What does the sun do when you are out for
your walk ? — // moves, when I don't move it doesn't move
either. And the moon too. — And if you go backwards ? —
It goes back."

Kenn (7) : " You've seen the moon, haven't you ? —
Yes. — What does it do ? — It follows us. — Does it follow
us really and truly? — Yes. — But it doesn't move? — No.
— Then it doesn't follow us really and truly ? — It follows
us. — Why does it follow us ? — To show us the road. — Does
it know the road ?^ — Yes. — WTiich roads ? — . . . — Does
it know the (Geneva roads ? — Yes. — And the Saleve roads ?
— No. — And the roads in France ? — No. — Then what
about the people in France ? What does the moon do ? —
It follows them. — Is the moon there as well ? — Yes. — Is it
the same moon as here.- — No, another one."

We have already given Giamb's answers at the age of
7 concerning magic (Chapter IV, § 2). We were able to
question him again at 8| : he still believed that the sun
and moon followed him. " When you are out for a walk,
what does the sun do ? — It follows us. — And the moon ? —
Yes, like the sun. — If someone were to meet you, which
would it follow 7— It would follow one until he went home
and then it would follow the other."

Blond (8) : The moon " goes with us\{avance avec nous)
it follows us. — Does it really follow us or is it only as if it
followed us ? — It really follows us."

Sart (i2|) : " Can the moon do whatever it likes ? —
Yes. When you are walking, it follows you. — Does it follow
you or does it not really move ? — It follows me. It stops
if I stop. — If I were to walk too, which of us would it
follow ? — Me.— Which ? — You. — Do you think it follows
everybody ? — Yes. — Can it be everywhere at the same
time? . . ."

The spontaneity of these answers is apparent. Counter-
suggestion makes no difference. The question as to
whether the sun and moon really follow us or only appear
to do so is not understood. The question of the two

2i8 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

people walking in opposite directions puzzles the child but
does not disillusion him. The following answers of the
second and third stages show clearly enough by comparison
how far the preceding answers really point to a fixed and
systematic conviction.

The following are examples of the second stage ; the
sun and the moon follow us though without themselves
moving : —

Sart (ii ; 5) : " Does the moon move ? — Yes. — When
you are out for a walk what happens ? — Yon see it moving
forward all the time. — Does it follow us or not ? — It follows
us because it's big. — Does it move (avance) or not ? — Yes.
— When the moon follows us, does it move (bouge) or
not ? . . . — I don't know." Sart obviously does not
understand ; on the one hand he has the idea that the
moon followed us and on the other the idea that it does
not move and he is unable to make the synthesis.

Lug (i2 ; 3) will not rest content hke Sart with two
contradictory beliefs at the same time, but attempts
to reconcile them : " What does the moon do when
you are out walking ? — It follows us. — Why ? — Its rays
follow MS.— Does it move ? — It moves, it follows us. — Then
tell me . . . (example of the two people walking in opposite
directions). — It stays still. It can't follow the two at the
same time. — Has it ever happened to you that it couldn't
follow you ? — Sometimes when one runs. — Why ? — One's
going too fast. — Why does' it follow us ? — To see where we
are going.— Cu.n it see us ? — Yes. — When there are lots of
people in the town what does it do ? — It follows someone. —
Which person 1— Several people. — How does it do that ? —
With its rays. — Does it follow them really and truly ?• —
You'd think it was us and you'd think it was the moon. —
Does it move?— y^s, it moves. — What does it do? — It
stays still and its ravs follow us (!) "

Brul (8) : " What does the sun do when you are out
for a walk ? — It follows us. — Why ? — To make it light for
us. — Can it see us? — Yes. — Then it moves? — No, you'd
think it did. — Then what does follow us ? — // follows us,
but it stays in the same place (!) — How does it do that ?—
When yoH arc walking if you turn round it still shines on
your head. — How is that ? — When anyone looks at it tliey
always see it sinning on them." Brul then explains that
it " stays in the same place " but sends out " its rays."

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 219

The substance of these beliefs is clear. The child still
beheves that the sun follows us. But he has found out
(as we shall see Mart find out as the result of an experi-
ment) or has learned that the .sun does not move. He
cannot understand how these two facts are possible at
the same time. Therefore, Hke Sart, he admits the two
contradictory statements without attempting to reconcile
them ; in the same way we saw how Sart had learned
that the sun and moon are " big," but that he had not
understood the significance of this was clear from the
conclusions he drew. Or else, hke Lug and Brul, the child
tries to find a solution for himself, and maintains that the
sun is stationary but that its rays follow us !

The following two cases are intermediary between the
second and third stages : —

Mart (9:5): " What does the moon do whilst you are
walking }—It follows us and then it stays still. It's we that
move and the moon gets nearer us all the time we're moving.
— How does it follow us ? — It stays still and it's we who
come nearer it.- — How did you find that out ? — When you
pass in front of houses you don't see it any more, you only
see the wall. — Then what did you decide ? — That it hadn't
moved. — Why did you think it followed you ? — / made a
mistake ; when there wasn't a house there it was all the time
in front of me. — Why does it move ? — No one makes it
move ! It's in the same place all the time."

Falq (8) also says that the moon "follows us. — Why ?
— Because it's high up and every one can see it. — If you and
I were both walking but in opposite directions which of
us would it follow ? — It would follow you because it's
nearer you.- — Why ? — Because you're in front. — Why is it
nearer ? — It always stays in the same place."

Mart and Falq are still in the second stage in believing
that we move nearer the moon when we walk and that
the illusion has thus a real foundation. But they are
already in the third stage in no longer maintaining that
the moon changes place in any way (its rays no longer
follow us).

The following are examples of the third stage. The
illusion is now completely understood : —

220 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Pfx (7:3): " When you are out walking in the evening,
does the moon move ? — It's far away and you'd say it was
moving hut it's not really."

KuF (10 ; 9) : " When you're walking you'd say that
the moon was following you, because it is big. — Does it
follow us ? — No. I used to believe it followed us and that
it ran after us."

Due (7I) : " What does the sun do when you are out
for a walk ? — It shines. — Does it follow you ? — No, but
you can see it everywhere. — Why ? — Because it is very big."

The above answers show the development of the behef
in the purposive movement of the sun and moon. Their
perfect continuity and the richness of the detail in the
accounts of even the youngest children show very clearly
that we are dealing with a spontaneous belief, arising
from direct observation and already formulated by the
child before ever we questioned it. The generality of this
spontaneous belief is interesting from three points of view.

In the first place, the facts just stated show clearly
enough the child's behef in animism and in an animism
that is not very theoretical (its object is not to explain
natural phenomena), but affective. The sun and moon
take an interest in us : —

" The sun sometimes watches us," says Fran (9), " when
we're looking nice he looks at us.— Do you look nice ? —
Yes, on Sundays, when I'm dressed like a man." " The
moon looks at us and watches over us," says Ga (8^),
" when I walk, it walks ; when I stand still it stands still.
It copies like a parrot. — Why ? — It wants to do whatever I
do. — Why ? — Because it's inquisitive."

Pur (8 ; 8) : The sun moves " to hear what we're saying."
J AC (6) : " It looks to see if we're being good," and the
moon " watches to see that people are working properly
(Cam, 6), etc.

Secondly, these beliefs are extremely interesting from
the light they throw on the relationship between magic
and animism. The reader will remember that certain
children (Chapter IV, § 2) beheve that they themselves
cause the movement of the sun and moon : " It's me when
I walk " (who makes them move), said Nain at 4 years old,

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 221

" it's us," said Giamb at 7. The children we have just
quoted have, on the contrary, the impression of being
followed by spontaneous beings who could if they so
wished go elsewhere. There is therefore magic or animism
according as the causal emphasis is laid on the self or on
the movement. How is this relationship to be regarded ?
There is obviously in such a case complete mutual de-
pendence between magic and animism. The starting
point is a feeling of participation resulting from ego-
centricity, that is to say from confusion between the self
and the world ; the child, from always seeing the sun and
moon either above or beside him, comes also to believe,
by reason of the already formed affective associations
which produce child egocentricity, that between the move-
ments of the sun and moon and his own movements there
is either dynamic participation or a common purpose.
In so far as the child accepts and does not reflect on this
common purpose and therefore does not question whether
the sun and moon are capable of resisting this obligation
to follow us, the attitude is one of magic : he has the
impression that it is he himself who makes the sun and
moon move. On the other hand, in so far as he is surprised
at the obedience of the sun and moon and endows them
with the power of resisting, he animates them in so doing
and attributes to them the will and the desire to follow
him. In short, between magic and animism there is only
a difference in egocentricity. Absolute egocentricity
implies magic ; the feeUng that other beings have an
independent existence, on the contrary, weakens the
primitive participations and emphasises the purposive
character of these beings.

Finally, the beliefs analysed in this section are of great
importance to the understanding of the child's conception
of dynamics, and we shall thus meet with them again in
deahng with the explanation of natural movements. It
is found in fact that children of the ages of j-% generally
maintain that the movement of the sun and moon is due
to the air, the wind, the clouds, etc. This seems to suggest

222 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

a mechanical explanation. But, at the same time, the
sun and moon are thought to follow us. Thus added to
the mechanical forces, there is a magico-animistic factor
which points to the real significance of the child's
mechanical conception — to say that the way the sun and
moon foUow us is due to the wind, etc., amounts to the
same as saying that the wind, the clouds, etc. are accom-
phces, and are equally concerned with us and that all
things gravitate around man.

We are thus led to study the type of necessity the child
attributes to natural laws. Having once examined this
question we may then proceed directly to the problem of
the origin of child animism.

§ 3. Physical Determinism and Moral Necessity.
— As we saw in Chapter V, there are two uses to which
a child may put an animistic conception of nature. These
are to explain the fortuitous and to explain the regularity
of things. Now to explain away the chance occurrence
means to exclude it and to seek to bring everything within
definite laws. But what are these laws ? As Sully has
shown and as we have ourselves been able to verify
{Language and Thought, Chapter V) they are moral and
social laws rather than physical laws. They are the
decus est. The key to child animism is this, that natural
beings are conscious according as they have a part to play
in the economy of things.

This characteristic explains both the role and the limits
of child animism. We have already stated many times
that the child is not so anthropomorphic as is usually
supposed. He onlj' endows things with consciousness
when it is strictly necessary in order that they may fulfil
their respective functions. Thus a child of 7 will refuse
to admit that the sun can see one in a room or that it
knows one's name but wiU maintain that it can go with
us when we are walking because it has to accompany us
" to make us warm," etc. The water in a river cannot
see its banks, it knows nothing of pleasure or pain ; but
it knows that it is moving and it knows when it needs to

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 223

get up speed in order to overcome some obstacle. For the
river moves " so as to give us water," etc.

The following conversation is ^significant in this
respect : —

Vern (6) a child we have never questioned on animism
and whom we now saw for the first time. We asked him
why a boat floats on the water whilst a little stone, which
is lighter, sinks immediately.. Vern reflected and then
said : " The boat is more inteUigait than the stone. — What
does ' to be intelligent ' mean ? — It doesn't do things it
ought not to do." — (Note the confusion between the moral
and the phy.sical). " And is the table intelligent ? — // is
cut ( =it is made of wood that has been cut), it can't talk,
it can't say anything. — And is the sun intelligent }—Yes,
because it wants to make things icarm.— And the house ? —
No, because it's made of stone. The stones are all shut up
{fermees) (meaning that they neither speak nor see, but
are material). — Are clouds intelligent ? — No, because they
try to fight the sun (they do the opposite to the sun). —
Is the moon intelligent ? — Yes, because it shines at night.
It lights the streets, and hunters too I think in the forests. —
Is the water in streams intelligent ? — It is rather good too
[elle est aussi un peu gentUle)."

These remarks are certainly interesting. In analysing
the classification one is inevitably reminded of what
Aristotle termed " nature " and what he called " violence."
For Vern, the heat of the sun is " natural " since the sun
is guided by an internal force towards an end that is
useful to hfe, whilst the movements of the clouds are
" violent " since they counteract the sun. And further,
if one may be allowed to press the parallel, it should be
observed that Vern regards natural activity as " intelli-
gent," that is to say compelled not by physical " necessity "
(" necessity " being an obstacle to the activity of
" nature "), but by moral obhgation — not to do " things
it ought not to do."

These answers, therefore, confront us with the problem
inevitable to the study of child animism — as to what
" nature " means to the child. Is it a collection of physical
laws ? Or a well-regulated society ? Or a compromise

224 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

between the two ? This is what must now be considered.
We shall work on the hypothesis, based on the facts
collected in the previous chapters, that the child endows
things with consciousness principally in order to explain
their obedience to a hierarchy. It credits things with a
moral nature rather than with a psychology.

How can this hypothesis be verified ? The whole study
of the child's ideas of dynamics and physics which we
have attempted elsewhere, urges us to adopt it. But, in
the meanwhile we can simply ask children whether things
do what they want and if not, why not.

This procedure furnished us with very clear results.
Up to the ages of 7-8, children refused to admit that things
could act as they wanted, not because they lacked the
will to do so, but because their will is compelled by a
moral law, whose purpose is to regulate everything towards
the greatest good of man. The few exceptions we found
certainly confirm this interpretation ; when a child of
this age regards a certain object as lacking in all moral
obligation, he regards it therefore as free to act as it
wishes and free because no one is compelling it. Will is
thus present in things, but in the great majority of cases
this will is controlled by duty.

At the ages of about 7-8 on the other hand the first
notions of physical determination are to be found ; certain
movements, such as the motion of the clouds or of rivers
are explained more and more as due, no longer to a moral
obhgation, nor to a constraint of a moral law but to a
purely physical constraint. This new idea is however
slow to become systematised, it is only applied to certain
phenomena and it is only at about the ages of 11-12
that it can definitely take the place of the idea of a moral
law in the child's scheme of physics. Thus between the
ages of 7-8 and 11-12 we shall find various combinations
of moral necessity and physical determinism without its
being possible to subdivide this period strictly into stages.
Finally, it should be noticed that before the ages of y-8,
there is already an element of physical compulsion

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 225

naturally present in the child's conception of the world,
but this compulsion is still very different from the deter-
minism which appears after the ages of 7-8 ; it consists
rather in what might be called the material compulsion
which necessarily accompanies moral necessity in the
child's eyes.

We shall now quote some examples taken at random,
showing in each case the pari: played by moral necessity
and physical determinism respectively : —

Reyb (8 ; 7) : " Can the clouds do as they like ? — No. —
Can they move more quickly if they want to ? — No. —
Can they stop if they want to ? — No. — Why not ? —
Because they're moving all the time. — Why ? — So as to show
it's going to rain {Parce que pour annoncer la pluie) ." " Can
the sun do what it hkes ? — Yes. — Can it stop moving if it
wants to ? — No, because if it were to stop it wouldn't
shine. — Can the moon do what it wants ? — No. — Can
it stay still if it wants to ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because if
it wants to it can stop moving. — Can it set (aller se
coucher) when it wants to ? — No, because it shines at
night." If the above remarks of Reyb are compared
with the following it will be seen that the regularity of
the movements of the clouds, the sun arid the moon
is explained by their function, whilst that of rivers is
explained by determinism : " Can rivers do as they
Hke ? — No. — Why not ? — Because they're flowing all the
time. — Why ? — Because they can't stop. — Why not ? —
Because they're flowing all the time. — Why ? — Because the
wind is driving them. It makes the waves come and makes
them flow."

ZiM (8 ; i) supposes that the moon can do as it hkes.
But there are limits to its powers : " Can it not come in
the evening if it doesn't want to ? — No. — Why not ? —
Because it's not it who gives the orders (!) " The sun can do
as it hkes, but this amounts to the same thing : "It
knows it's behind tl\e mountain ? — Yes. — Did it want to
go there or did it have to ? — // wanted to. — Why ? — So as
to make it good weather {parce que pour que (a fasse beau
temps)."

Rat (8 ; 10) : " Can the clouds go faster if they want
to ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because they go by themselves. — Can
they go away when they want to ? — Yes. — Could they go
to-day when it's raining ? — Yes. — Then why don't they ?

226 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

— Because they don't. — Why not ? — Because it's raining. —
Is it they who wanted it to rain ? — No. — What then ? —
God. — Could the sun stop shining if it wanted to }-Yes.
— Could it come in the middle of the night if it wanted
to ? — It wouldn't want to. It's night-time, time to go to
bed. — Could it if it wanted to ? — Yes. — Has it ever done
so ? — No. — Why not ? — It likes to go to bed better. — You
really beheve that ? — Yes. — Why doesn't it come in
the middle of the night ?— // can't.— Why not ? — // it
doesn't come it isn't light. If it comes it's light. — Then why
doesn't it come and make it light at night ? — The moon
makes it a bit light. — Can't the sun come too ? — It doesn't
want to. — Could it come }—Yes. — Then why doesn't it ?
— People would think it was morning. — Why doesn't it let
them ? — It doesn't want to." The moon obeys for similar
reasons : " Could the moon stop in the middle of the
night if it wanted to ? — No, because it has to shine a bit
longer."

Ross (9 ; 9) : " Can the sun do what it likes ? — Yes. —
Can it go quicker if it wants to ? — Yes. — Can it stop ? —
No. — Why not ? — Because it has to shine for some time. —
Why ? — To ivarm us."

Imh (6) : " Can the clouds do what they like ? — No,
because all they do is to show us the way." We here find the
clouds charged with the necessity of following us which
other children attribute only to the sun and moon. This
reply is all the more significant since Imh is well aware of
the part played by determinism in what concerns streams ;
for example : " Can the water in the streams do what it
likes ? — No, it can flow faster , but only when it slopes."

JuiLL (7^) : " Can the sun do what it likes ? — Yes. —
Can it go away in the middle of the day ? — No. — Why
not ? — Because it's already light. — And so ? — // can't. —
Can it go at 12 o'clock ? — No. — Why not ? — Because it's
already day-time. — What makes it day-time ? -God. —
Could he make it day without the sun ? — Yes. — Must the
sun be there when it's day ? — Yes, or else it would rain."

SCHI (6) : " Could the sun go away at 12 o'clock if it
wanted to ? — No. — Why not ?- Because it has to shine the
whole day."

Kent {9 ; 3) : The sun cannot do as it likes " because
it has to go and make it day where it goes every day." The
law of its movement is thus a moral law. So too with the
clouds and the wind : " They always have to go to the same
place." The stars "have to go at night where they were

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 227

the other night." The streams " have always to go where
there's a path in front of them."

The following two cases are exceptions ; the first is
that of a child who endows all objects with freedom of
movement for the reason that they are " alone," that is
to say that no one commands them nor supervises what
they do.

Had (6) : " Can the sun do whatever it hkes ? — Yes,
because it's alone with the moon. — And the clouds ? — Yes,
because they are alone with the other clouds," etc. The
meaning of these words is sufficiently clear from the
following answer : " Can you do whatever you Uke ? — Yes,
because my mother sometimes lets me."

The exception is thus only apparent. Again a child may
attribute freedom to all objects, but at the same time
credits them with " good will " (bonne volonte) which
again makes the answers only an apparent exception to
the preceding ones : —

Mont (7) : " Can the sun do whatever it hkes ? — Yes.
— Can it stop giving light ? — Yes. — Then why doesn't it ?
— It wants it to be fine weather. — Can streams do as they
Hke ? — Yes. — Could they go faster if they wanted to ? —
Yes. — Could the Rhone stop flowing ? — Yes. — And why
doesn't it ? — It wants there to be water," etc.

Finally, it should be noted that will is the most per-
sistent form of the animistic powers which the child
attributes to things. In fact, children are found at the
ages of 10-12 who no longer ascribe consciousness or life
to nature yet still endow it with will and effort,

KuF (10 ; i) : " Are streams alive ? — No. — Do they
know they are moving ? — No. — Can they want things ? —
No. — Can they want to go faster ? — Yes. — And the same
with the sun ? Would the sun like to go faster some-
times ? — Yes. — Does it feel that it would like to go faster ?
— No." And for Kuf the sun can actually go faster or
slower according as it wants to.

The importance of these facts for the evolution of the
concept of " force " is unmistakably clear. This con-

228 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

tinuity established between force and animism by reason
of the concept of an " unconscious will " should be noted.
The question will be taken up later.

For the present we may conclude that the child is led
to explain the uniformity of nature by moral much rather
than by natural laws. Things are endowed with a will
which they make use of to suit their pleasure and nothing
is impossible to them. On the one hand, they are concerned
with us, and their will is above all a good will, that is to
say a will aiming at man's good. On the other hand,
however, there are certain Hmitations. Natural objects
are not sovereign forces : " It's not itself that gives the
orders," said Zim, speaking of the moon. It is true that
after the ages of 7-8 certain movements, such as those of
streams or of clouds, are explained, more and more as due
to a physical determinism. But until about the ages of
11-12, there remain a great number of objects, particularly
the sun, the moon and the wind, which still obey the
primitive moral laws.

It would be interesting to determine at each age the
exact proportion of explanations due to moral necessity
and physical determinism respectively. But the most
fruitful method of attaining this is not the one we have
used, but one less verbal and artificial, which consists in
making the child explain the reason for each natural
movement and phenomenon. We shall attempt it later.
The foregoing must therefore be regarded as a simple
introduction to the child's dynamics, intended above all
to determine the meaning of child animism and to show
the contact between this animism and the vaster pro-
blems involved in conceptions of movement.

§ 4. Conclusions. The Significance of the
Questions on Child Animism, and the Nature of
" Diffuse Animism." — The results obtained by means of
the various procedures described in Chapters V and VI
must be interpreted with the greatest caution. They have
in fact a common fault ; their dependence on words. The
children's answers were not concerned with concrete

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 229

objects which were handled so as to make them understand
their mechanism but with things about which we had
merely spoken. What we obtained is therefore not ani-
mism as it actually functions but the definition of the words
"hving," "knowing," "feeling," etc. These definitions
certainly contained constant elements and if our ambition
were hmited to the study of verbal inteUigence we could
treat the results with confidence. But how far can they
throw hght on the question of intelligence in perception ?

To make this matter clear we must retain only what
may be called the negative element in the answers and
not the positive content of each statement. From this
point of view two conclusions may be noted.

The first is that the child's thought begins with a lack
of differentiation between living and inert bodies since
it possesses no criterion by which to make the distinction.
For us, or rather for adult common sense, two types of
criterion aid this distinction. First, the fact that hving
bodies are bom, grow and die. But curiously enough
none of the children we tested ever invoked this criterion.
Sometimes, indeed, the child told us that plants " grow "
(poussent) but this was for him a way of regarding them
as endowed with spontaneous movement, and the move-
ment of growth was thus conceived as of the same order
as the movement of the clouds or of the sun. Moreover,
we shall see in studying child artificiahsm that to a child
almost all bodies are bom and grow ; the sun and moon
" are bom and grow (poussent)," mountains, stones, iron
" grow " etc. The facts clearly prove that the origin and
growth of things cannot serve the child as criteria for
distinguishing the hving from the inert. From this point
of view there is perfect continuity between all natural
objects.

In the second place, in distinguishing hving from
inorganic matter, adult common sense also makes use
of the principle of inertia, which, since the development
of industry, has become more and more one of our intellec-
tual habits. An inaminate body only moves in response

230 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

to an external influence, whereas, as common sense asserts,
a living being creates movements. But this distinction
is obviously of recent date, and it is therefore no wonder
that the children we found in the third stage, those pre-
cisely who define life in terms of spontaneous movement,
were still unable to form a distinction between the
apparently spontaneous movement of the sun, the moon,
the wind, etc., and the movements of animals.

In short, however cautiously one proceeds and whatever
pains one takes to avoid interpreting the children's
answers too literally, it remains an undoubted fact that
child thought starts with the idea of a universal life as
its primary assumption. From this point of view, animism
is in no sense the product of a structure built up by the
child's reflection but is a primitive principle and it is only
by a series of progressive differentiations that inert matter
comes to be distinguished from that which is living. In
this light, activity and passivity, spontaneous and
acquired movement, are bracketed ideas that become
gradually detached by thought from the primitive
continuum in which all is regarded as living.

The second conclusion is that if the living and the inert
are undifferentiated in the primitive state the same is
true a fortiori for conscious action and unconscious move-
ment, or let us rather say for purposive actions and
mechanical movements. It may be questioned whether
the children's statements concerning the consciousness of
things were reflective, but it must in any case be admitted
that the distinction between purposive actions and
mechanical movements is not only not innate but supposes
an already very developed state of mind. No positive
experience can in fact compel a mind to admit that
things work neitlier lor n(^r at^ainst us and that chance
and inertia alone count in nature. To arrive at such an
objective view of things the mind must free itself from
subjectivity and abandon its innate egocentricity. We
have already shown what difficulties such an operation
involves for the child.

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 231

In short, in so far as it is led to endow things with
consciousness, child animism is not the result of a structure
built up by reflection but results from the primitive
property of mind which consists in the complete lack of
differentiation between conscious action and mechanical
movement. Child animism presupposes a primitive state
of belief in a continuum of consciousness. Or rather it is not
.strictly either knowing or feeling that the child attributes
to things but a sort of elementary awareness and will,
the minimum necessary to accomplish the functions
required by nature. This attributing of will and aware-
ness does not mean that the child regards things as
persons — actually, his sense of personality is much less
strong than ours — but simply that he confuses purpose
and activity. There is a Jewish story that tells how two
dull-witted fellows were once having a dispute as to when
water boils. One maintained that it boils at 100''. " But,"
objected the other, " how does it know it's reached 100° ? "
This story illustrates the true meaning of child animism ;
namely in so far as things show an activity which is
reliable in its constancy and utiUty to man, they must
possess a psychic hfe.

Reduced to its just proportions, child animism thus
becomes dependent on a number of fundamental peculiar-
ities of child thought whirh makes it more acceptable in
the eyes of the ps3'chologists than if it bore the appearance
of a disinterested and merely theoretical systematisation.
Three considerable groups of phenomena point, in fact,
to the universal purposiveness which children attribute
to objects.

Firstly, there is the child's finalistic attitude, the re-
markable prevalence of which is well known. In con-
sidering the first stage in the evolution of the notion of
life (§ i) we noted the definition of objects according
to their utility, characteristic of the child's mentality
between the ages of 3 and 8. As to mechanical move-
ments, the research described in § 3 sufficiently showed
that natural laws are interpreted by finalism. Our

232 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

further researches will show that this finalism colours
the whole of their physics — the buoyancy of bodies, the
movement of the air in a pump, the function of fire and
of steam in an engine, etc. This tendency clearly shows
to what an extent the child's universe is governed by ideas
of purpose, both in its broad aspects and in its smallest
details.

A second group of facts pointing to the same conclusions
is furnished by the evolution of questions between the
ages of 3 and 7. As has already been shown {Language
and Thought, Chapter V) these " Whys " are not strictly
either causal or finahstic. They lie between the two,
which means that the real cause that the child tries to
connect with the phenomenon is precisely a purpose,
which is at the same time both the efficient cause and the
justification of the effect with which he is concerned. In
other words, the purpose is creative, the physical cause
and the logico-moral reason are still confused in a sort of
universal psychological motive impulse.

This is the explanation — which brings us to the third
group of phenomena — of why the child starts by confusing
physical necessity and moral necessity. If the facts
quoted in the preceding section, and which will be con-
stantly cropping up again in a much more spontaneous
form, cannot be regarded as the proof of a systematic and
exphcit animism they are at any rate a clear indication
in favour of supposing that the child attributes to nature
a uni^•ersal purpose (see Causalite Physique).

It may be claimed, it» is true, that the three groups of
facts just drawn on do not prove that a child locates the
purpose he imagines in connection with a thing, within
the thing itself. Such a purpose may equally belong to
the creator or creators such as the men (" Messieurs ") by
whom everything has been made. The following chapters
will show precisely that such a child artificialism exists
and that it is as systematic as animism and supposes nature
to have been " created " (" fabriquee ") by men. But the
problem is to determine whether the child begins by con-

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 233

ceiving things as created by man and only then seeks for
the purpose which may underlie individual things or
whether on the contrary he is not first led to seek a purpose
in all things and only then to classify these purposes as
belonging to the creator (artificialism) or belonging to
the things themselves (animism). Now we know that the
" why," whose appearance coincides exactly with the need
to seek for a purpose in everything, begins to arise between
the ages of 2 and 3, that is to say at a time when artificial-
ism is evidently not yet much systematised. The most
probable course of the child's mind is, therefore, that which
lies in first seeking for purposes and not till then classifying
the subjects to which the purposes are related. So that
the three groups of facts summoned to support animism,
or the attribution of purpose to things, as it might be
called in the terms of the present thesis, point to arti-
ficialism as much as to animism.

Moreover, it will be shown that at first no such conflict
exists between animism and artificialism as might have
been supposed ; that the child regards a body, such as the
sun for example, as having been made by man is no
reason why he should not regard it also as living, and
living in the same way as a child born to its parents.

In conclusion then, the structure of child animism or
rather of its diffuse animism, in opposition to the more
systematic beliefs regarding the sun, moon, etc. (§ 2) may
be characterised as follows.

Nature presents a continuum of life, such that every
object possesses activity and awareness in some degree.
This continuum is a network of purposive movements,
more or less mutually dependent on one another and all
tending towards the good of humanity. Gradually the
child picks out certain centres of force within this
continuum as being animated by a more spontaneous
activity than the rest. But the choice of these centres
does not become fixed for a long while. For example, the
child first attributes autonomous activity to his own
person, which has the power of making the sun and the

234 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

clouds advance, then to the sun and clouds themselves,
wliich move of their own accord, then to the wind which
causes the sun and the clouds to move, etc. The centre
of force is thus -gradually shifted. This is what explains
the vague and unsystematic character of the answers
obtained. But although the choice of centres may be
undecided the reasons which determine it need not be.
Activity in general, movement in general, spontaneous
movement opposed to imparted movement : these were
the three themes that we found continually recurring in
the minds of the children tested, introducing a progressive
differentiation within the primitive continuum of life and
purpose.

§ 5. Conclusions {continued) : the Origins of Child
Animism. — Ribot has remarked that ^ : "In consequence
of a well-known though inexplicable instinctive tendency,
man attributes purposes, will and causality similar to
his own to all that acts and reacts around him, to his
fellow-men, to living beings and to those things whose
movements make them appear as if alive (clouds, rivers,
etc.) " This phenomenon may be seen " amongst children,
savages, animals (such as the dog who bites the stone
that hits him) ; even the reflective man, returning for the
moment to his instinctive state, loses his temper with
the table into which he bumps." Freud ^ explains animism
as due to a " projection " of which he speaks thus : " To
project internal perceptions outside is a primitive mechan-
ism, which our sensory perceptions for example undergo
in the same way, and which consequently plays a principal
part in our representation of the external world." Are
this " inexplicable tendency " of Ribot and this " primitive
mechanism " of Freud really inexplicable ? Or is the
problem only insoluble because badly stated, and this
because certain implicit postulates concerning the limits
between the self and the external world alone make
" projection " of the internal contents necessary ?

* L'dvDlulion drs idics ginirales. 4th edition, p. 206.

* Totem and Taboo.

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 235

Indeed, for a certain school of psychology, consciousness
of self is due above all to the direct sensation of something
internal : for Maine de Biran, the feehng of effort ; for
Ribot, the sum of the kinfesthetic sensations, etc. Thus
the consciousness of self is developed independently of
consciousness of the external world. And so in order to
explain that thought endows objects with Hfe, purpose,
forces, it is necessary to speak of " projection." Stated
in these terms the question certainly becomes insoluble.
Why should one project rather than see things as they
are ? And if one is but the victim of a deceptive analogy
between things and the self, why is this analogy so firmly
fixed that neither experience nor time can undeceive a
mind thus inclined ?

Let us rather return to the hypothesis to which the
study of the relations between the self and the external
world led us. Going back to the starting point in the life
of thought we find a protoplasmic consciousness unable
to make any distinction between the self and things. In
the formation of this consciousness two types of factors
combine. First come tlie biological or individual factors
which control the relations between the organism and its
environment. According to all the evidence it is impossible
in any biological reaction whatsoever to separate the
organism from its environment. The intellectual adapta-
tion and the motor adaptation from which the former is
derived are no exception to this rule. Reality is a complex
system of exchanges and complementary currents, tiie
first determined by the assimilation of things to the
organism and the second by the adaptation of the organism
to the facts of the environment. The most substantial
part of Bergson's Matter and Memory is where he demon-
strates that perception is situated in the object as much
as in the brain, since there is a perfect continuity between
the impulse in the brain and the movements of the object.
There is thus in the beginning neither self nor external
world but a continuum. The social factors also tend to
the same result ; from its earliest activities the baby is

236 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

brought up in a social atmosphere, in the sense that its
parents, especially the mother, intervene in all its pctions
(feeding, suckling, gripping objects, language) and in all
its affections. Thus according to this point of view every
action is part of a context, so that the consciousness of
self does not accompany the child's early movements in
any innate manner but is only gradually revealed as a
function of the contacts experienced with the behaviour
of others. Thus both the social and the biological factors
combine at the beginning of the mental life to ensure an
absence of differentiation between the world and the self,
whence arise the feeUngs of participation and the magical
mentality which results.

If such is the starting point for the child's consciousness
it is easier to reaUse the origins of animism. Four groups
of causes, in fact, meet in the genesis of animism ; two
belong to the individual and two to the social order.

Those belonging to the individual order are as follows :
First, there is indissociation of the contents of the primitive
consciousness ; for, since ideas of action and of purpose,
•etc. are necessarily bound together until the progressive
dissociation of its ideas leads the child to distinguish
purposive from non-purposive actions, the world is
regarded by the primitive consciousness as a continuous
whole that is both psychical and physical at the same
time. Secondly, there is introjection according to which
the child endows objects with feelings equivalent to those
he himself experiences in hke circumstances.

Before proceeding to analyse these two factors a dis-
tinction must be made between two types of animistic
tendency found among the children tested. We shall give
the name of diffuse animism to the general tendency of
children to confuse the Uving and the inert, that is to say
the condition described in the preceding section (§ 4).
We shall describe as systematic animism the sum total of
the explicit animistic beUefs held by the child and of
which the clearest is that according to which it beHeves
that the sun and moon follow him (§ 2). We shall show

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 237

that, broadly speaking, diffuse animism is explained by
indissociation, rather than by introjection which accounts
more for systematic animism. But it goes without saying
that such a schema is too simple and must be comphcated
by numerous qualifications.

Having said this, we shall now attempt to formulate
the role played by indissociation. The study of child
reahsm (Chapters I-IV) showed that certain elements,
one subjective and the other objective, cannot be dis-
sociated in the child's thought, although to us they appear
independent. So far, these are names and the things
named, thought and the things thought of, etc. But the
same holds true concerning movement and life ; all
external movement is regarded as necessarily purposive.
So too for activity in general and consciousness ; all
activity is regarded as necessarily conscious. So too, at
least in the primitive state, are being and knowing ; every
object is regarded as knowing what it is, where it is and
what attributes it possesses, etc. In short, the facts of
child reahsm show that the mind proceeds from indis-
sociation to dissociation and that mental development
does not in any sense consist in successive associations.
Diffuse animism is thus a primary datum in the child's
consciousness.

It is true that there exists the following difference
between realism strictly speaking (such as nominal realism,
etc.) and the indissociation from which animism arises.
Realism constitutes what is, so to speak, a primary
indissociation ; that is one which consists simply in
situating in things characteristics which belong in truth
to mind, but which the mind does not yet reahse as
belonging to it (names, for example). The indissociation
which characterises animism is on the contrary a secondary
indissociation, which consists in attributing to things,
characteristics similar to those which the mind attributes
to itself — such as consciousness, will, etc. Is this a case
of projection ? Certainly not. That which secondary
indissociation adds to primary indissociation is simply the

238 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

unifying element in the idea of a particular object ; that
is, it associates groups of qualities into individual entities
rather than attributing them to reality at large. But it
is the distinguishing mark of the realist mind — and herein
lies the indissociation — to arrive at the idea of an object
by making use of notions and categories which combine
an objective term with the subjective term and which
regard them as necessarily indissociable ; thus instead of
thinking of the sun as an object which shines, is hot and is
endowed with movement, the realist mind thinks of it as
an object that knows it shines, that intentionally makes
us warm and that moves according to the needs of its
own life.

The fundamental postulate in all the answers obtained
concerning the endowment of consciousness to objects and
the concept of " hfe " is, in fact, the imphcit assumption
that all activity is conscious and all movement spon-
taneous. When Schi maintains that the clouds know they
are moving " because it is they that make the wind," when
Ross says the wind is conscious " because it is it that blows,"
etc., there is an implicit identification between " doing "
and " knowing what one does." There is animism through
lack of dissociation.

Why, however, is this indissociation of ideas so per-
sistent ? We need only note in what manner dissociation
works to realise that its operation is neither simple nor
spontaneous. No direct experiment can possibly lead the
child to the discovery that a movement is not purposive
or that an activity is not conscious. The power of dis-
sociating does not arise from a wider knowledge nor
from a developed abihty to control circumstances nor
from experimentation but from a radical change in the
habits of mind. Only a quahtative development of the
child's mind can lead it to abandon animism.

What is the explanation of this change in the child's
trend of mind ? The dissociation of ideas can only result
from his becoming progressively aware of his self and his
own thought. As regards the realism involved in names,

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 239

etc., we have already tried to show that it is the discovery
of the symbolic and therefore human quality of names
which leads the child, first to dissociate the sign from the
thing signified, then to distinguish internal from external,
and then finally to differentiate the psychic from the
physical. The progressive diminution of his animistic
behefs follows a similar course. According as the child
becomes clearly aware of personality in himself he refuses
to allow a personality to things. According as he realises
his own subjective activity and its inexhaustible scope he
refuses to allow self-consciousness to things. Tylor has
maintained with regard to savages, that it is the discovery
of the existence of thought that brings animism into being.
Far from its being so with children, it is ignorance of the
psychic which makes them attribute life to things and it
is the realisation of the fact of a thinking subject which
leads them to abandon animism. In short the dissocia-
tion of ideas arises from the growth of the consciousness of
self.

This interpretation can be justified by facts which are
not limited to those we collected on the subject of child
realism. As late as the age of 11-12 a phenomenon is still
to be found which suggests what has probably been
taking place during earher years ; this is the difhculty
experienced in imagining that one can have the slightest
illusion concerning one's own self. The fact is that the
less a mind is given to introspection the more it is the
victim of the illusion that it knows itself perfectly. The
following cases illustrate this ; —

Among the nonsense sentences proposed by Ballard as
tests ^ is one phrased as follows : "I am not proud, since
I don't think myself half as clever as I am in reahty."
We submitted this sentence to a number of particularly
inteUigent children between the ages of 11 and 13. The
answer, where the children had understood the proposition,
was always the same, namely, that the absurdity lies in
your supposing yourself less clever than you really are.

^ See Brtt. Journal of Psychology, October 1921.

240 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

If you are clever, the child argues, you know you are ; if
you think yourself only half as clever as you really are it
is because you are only half as clever, etc. You know
what you are, you must know yourself, etc. The point of
all these answers is, in short, the impossibility of having
any illusions respecting one's self.

The above may be an indication only, but it is significant.
We all know that we have illusions concerning ourselves
and that knowledge of one's self is the hardest of all
knowledge. Of this, a mind uncultivated, Uke the child's,
knows nothing. It thinks it knows itself and it beHeves
this exactly in proportion to how little it does know itself.
But, if this is so at the ages of ii and 12, one can imagine
what the consciousness of self must be in the first years —
the child must suppose he is aware of everything that
happens to him, and inversely he can have no idea of any
unconscious or involuntary action whatsoever. It is only
by a series of experiences of a social or inter-individual
type, causing him to reahse that other people's behaviour
is not always necessarily intelligent or even intentional, and
that one may oneself act under the sway of strange illusions,
that the mind forms such improbable conceptions as move-
ment without consciousness or existence without awareness.
Naturally, we are not suggesting that the disappearance of
animism is necessarily connected with the advent of the
idea that there are psychologically unconscious states. We
simply maintain that the dissociation of the primitive
semi-psychic, semi-physical ideas, in other words the
" depersonaUsation " of reahty is bound up with the
growth of self-consciousness. So long as the child knows
nothing of introspection, he supposes he knows himself
perfectly and beUeves other things to be conscious of
themselves. Inversely, according as the child comes to
realise his self he builds up a whole scale of differing tpyes
of action, from voluntary and reflective action to involun-
tary and unconscious action.

In short, animism, or at any rate diffuse animism,
results from the indissociation of primitive ideas and only

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 241

the growth of the knowledge of the self (resulting from
social intercourse and comparisons with others) can enable
these ideas to become dissociated. But to explain
animism thus, seems nothing more than to substitute bare
assertion for the idea of " projection," an idea which at
least provides something resembUng an explanation. And
so long as psychology is isolated from biology and the
world is postulated as independent of the mind which
adapts itself to it, this is obviously true. But if we wiU
only seek in biology the roots of mental operations
and give thought its true context by starting from the
relation of the organism to its environment, we shall
see that the obscure notion of " projection," that is
to say of the transposition of the internal contents
of consciousness into the external world, arises from
the illegitimate and ontological use of the ideas of
" internal " and " external." The biological reahty is
the assimilation of the environment by the organism
and the transformation of the organism into a function
of the environment. It is a continuity of exchanges.
These exchanges naturally suppose an internal and an
external pole but each term is in a relation of con-
stant equihbrium and natural dependence on the other.
Such is the reahty from which the intelligence gradually
extracts the ideas of a self and an external world. To
say that at the beginning the self and the world are con-
fused is to replace the inexpUcable " projection " of the
self into things by the idea of assimilation of 'the external
world by the self, an assimilation which is undoubtedly
continuous with the biological assimilation itself. The
remainder of oui research and in particular the inquiry
into the origins of the idea of force (see Causalitd Physique)
are aimed at developing the implications of this idea, so
that it is unnecessary to pursue it further at the moment.
But the indissociation of ideas can account only for
diffuse animism. Certain systematic convictions such as
that according to which the clouds and the sun foUow us
and are concerned with our doings, etc., seem to imply the

242 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

intervention of other factors. It is here that we need to
call in introjection, that is to say the tendency to situate
in others or in things the reciprocal feelings to those we
experience from their contact.

The principle of introjection is clear enough. All that
either resists or obeys the self is thought to possess an
activity as distinct as that of the self which commands or
tries to overcome the resistance. Thus the consciousness
of effort supposes force in the resisting object, the
consciousness of desire supposes that of purpose in the
obstacle, the consciousness of pain that of ill wiU in the
object which is causing the pain, etc.

The cause of the introjection evidently lies in ego-
centricity, namely in the tendency to believe that every-
thing evolves around the self. To win free of egocentri-
city, that is, to attain an impersonal view of things, is to
be rid of introjection. The following cases clearly illustrate
the mechanism. "Who made that scratch?" (indicating
her own hand), Nel questioned. " It hurts there ? It was
the wall that hit me." (Nel was aged 2:9). Or again, the
following recollection of his childhood by Michelet : —

" I had just escaped having my head guillotined by a
window sash. I had climbed on to a chair and was looking
down when the window fell with a crash. We both remained
a moment stupefied. I was fascinated by this window which
I had seen moving by itself like a person and even quicker
than I could. I was certain it had wanted to do me harm
and for a long while I never came near it without experiencing
feelings of fear and anger." ^

The above is the simplest type of case ; objects that
provoke pain or fear are regarded as doing so from a
conscious purpose, because the self is still egocentric and
in consequence is unable to give a disinterested or im-
personal judgment. Such cases are innumerable and it
is unnecessary to enumerate them further.

On the other hand, a particular case to which attention
must be drawn is that of the child who attributes to things

^ Michelet, Ma jeunesse, p. 17.

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 243

a movement of an anthropocentric character without
realising that this involves an illusion. Such is the case
when we believe that the sun and the clouds follow us. In
these cases not only does the child mistake the apparent
movement for the real, through failing to distinguish the
personal from the objective point of view, but also he
beheves forthwith that the pursuit is intentional, and by
introjection he attributes all manner of human feelings to
the sun and the moon.

The two following observations belong probably to this
category : —

One of us can distinctly recollect the curious experience
of turning round quickly to see if the things behind him
were still there or had disappeared.

A like experience gave rise to the following. Bohn (i)
reports this conversation with a boy of 5 ; i : " Daddy
is all that really here ? — What do you mean by all that ? —
All these things. Can I really see them all? — You can see
them and feel them. They are always there. — No, they
are not always there. When I turn away from them, they
aren't there. — When you turn back they are always in the
same place. — They are all alive. They are always moving
and going away. When I go close to them, they come close
to me. — But aren't they always in the same place ? — No, I
only dream them and they come into my dream and go out of
it again." Then the child walked slowly about the room
touching the things and saying : " Look at them coming and
going away again." ^

These two cases are of great interest. In both the child
wants to know whether the changes he observes in his
visual surroundings are due to his own change of position,
and therefore to his own activity, or to the things them-
selves. In so far as he tends to the second solution he is
animist. In so far as he adopts the first, that is to say is
aware of his own part in the continued transformation of
the perspective of objects he has ceased to be animist.
Both cases occurred at a time when the self, half conscious
of itself, felt the strangeness of wondering what part in

1 Pedagogical Seminary ^ 1916: " A child's questions."

244 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the structure of the world was played by things and what
by his own activity. The second child shows still, in
addition, a semi-magic attitude of participating with
things ; they " are in my dream."

In these last cases, and in numerous others of the same
type, animism thus results from egocentricity. The self
is sufficiently conscious of its limitations to know that
neither the sun nor things depend directly on its own
desire or will (which is why these cases show hardly any
magic), but this consciousness is not yet sufficiently
developed to realise that the apparent movements of
things are due to an illusion in his own perspective.

In short, introjection results from the egocentric
tendency to beUeve that everything gravitates around
us and it consists in attributing to things such powers
as they would need either to obey us, or to resist.

It would seem that we are here falling back on to the
solutions of Ribot or of Freud which regard animism as
due to a simple projection. But it must be clearly em-
phasised that introjection is impossible without the
indissociation just referred to. It may be described as a
tertiary indissociation (by contrast with the secondary
indissociation discussed above) which consists, in attri-
buting to things not only what belongs to us (Life and
consciousness, which the child regards as inseparable from
activity or from movement in general) but also charac-
teristics reciprocal to our own — malice when we are afraid,
obedience when we command, intentional resistance when
we cannot command obedience, etc. Introjection is in
fact impossible to a mind that is not reaUst — the stone
that hurts the child can only be regarded as wicked if all
activity is regarded as intentional, etc.

The mutual dependence of introjection and indissociation
is confirmed in the clearest manner by these circumstances.
The primitive indissociation of ideas has its origin, as has
been shown, in the child's realism, that is to say in the
absence of all knowledge of self or the incapacity to dis-
tinguish the activity of the thinking subject. Intro-

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 245

jection, on the other hand, is bound up with egocentricity
from which it arises and which it in turn fosters. But it
is precisely this egocentricity which accounts for realism
— it is the fact of being unable to distinguish the part
played by one's own perspective in one's conceptions of
objects which causes a mind to be reahst and unable to
distinguish the subjective from the objective.

Primitive consciousness is thus enclosed within a sort
of circle ; to separate the tangled ideas which confuse both
the objective and the subjective, thought must first
become conscious of itself and be distinguished from
things, but to be distinguished from things, thought must
not introject into them the illusory characteristics due to
an egocentric perspective. Moreover, in the degree in
which, by reason of exchange and discussions between
individuals, the self becomes aware of itself and breaks
away from its egocentricity, it ceases to introject feelings
into things and by dissociation of the confused primitive
ideas is able to escape from animism even in its diffuse
form.

It remains now to discuss the social factors which
favour the persistence of animism in children. Here, too,
two complementary groups may be distingiiished ; first,
the feelings of participation that the child's social environ-
ment must arouse in him, and secondly, the moral obhgation
which is forced on him by education.

The first of these factors is all important. As was
pointed out when considering magic, the child, whose
every activity is Unked from the cradle onwards to a com-
plementary activity on the part of his parents, must during
his first years Uve with the impression of being perpetually
surrounded by thoughts and actions directed to his well-
being. It must seem to him as if his every aim and motive
were known and shared by those surrounding him. He
must suppose himself to be continually seen, understood
and forestalled. Later, when the child begins to exchange
his thoughts with his brothers or friends he stiU maintains
this tendency to believe that his least syllable is under-

246 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

stood — a fact which, as we have seen, lies at the root of
his egocentric language {Language and Thought, Chapters
I, III) ; he supposes, that is, that his thought is common
to all since he has not attempted to escape from his own
personal point of view.

If this is so, this feeling of communion should colour
aU his vision of the world. Nature must appear peopled
with beings either favourable or disquieting. Animals, as
has often been noted, cause feelings of this sort and the
child certainly has the impression at times of being
understood by them or sometimes of making himself
understood.

Thus Nel (2:9), whose remarks were quoted in § 10,
has frequent conversations with animals : " Good-bye,
cow," she said to a cow. " Come here, cow. Come, cow."
And to a grasshopper : " You'll see, Miss Grasshopper " —
(and as it escapes) " What are you up to, grasshopper ? "

Pie (6) in front of an aquarium, looking at a salamander:
" Oh, look how surprised it is by that whopper (a fish).
Salamander, you ought to eat the fish ! "

This seems like romancing, but it must be remembered
that children of 8 years old still do not hesitate to believe
that animals know their names (see Chapter II, § 6) :
" Does a fish know that it is called a fish ? — Of course ! "
(Mart. 8 ; 10).

The cases quoted by Freud under the title of " infantine
returns to totemism " ^ are well known. Whatever be
the interpretation given to these facts, they teach two
things. First, that the child adopts certain animals into
his moral hfe. Secondly, by so doing, he attributes to
them a share in certain of the relations existing between
him and his parents, for example, if he has done wrong,
he feels that the animal knows all about it, etc. In the
examples Freud quotes, the part played by educators in
the genesis of the child's beliefs certainly needs question-
ing : people can always be found stupid enough to
threaten their children with the fury of dogs or horses if

^ Freud, Totem and Taboo.

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 247

they behave badly etc. But the spontaneous tendency
children show, when swayed by fear or remorse, to regard
the whole world as aware of their fault, is such a general
one that the cases quoted by Freud, Wulf, Ferenczi, etc.
certainly seem to contain an element of spontaneous
conviction.

It seems extremely probable that these feelings of
participation may be finally transferred to the things
themselves and that this fact constitutes one of the factors
of child animism. We seemed to find at least a trace of
this tendency of children to feel they are being seen and
even watched in certain answers, quoted in § 2 and
relating to the sun and moon. The moon " watches us,"
said Ga (8^). The sun moves " to hear what we are saying "
(Jac. 6). The moon is " curious " (Pur 8 ; 8). The sun
" watches us " (Fran 9), etc.. It has often been noticed,
too, how frightened children are when they see the moon
from their bed. " The moon sends our dreams " said
Ban at 4^. But most convincing is the case quoted
by James (see Chapter IV, § 2) of the deaf-mute who
associated the moon with his moral life and regarded it
as responsible for the punishments he received and finally
came to identify it with his own mother, long since
dead.

If this is the natural tendency of the child's mind, the
feeling of moral obhgation which he acquires m the course
of his education must be distmguished as a special factor
in animism. As M. Bovet has shown in his admirable
study ^ the feeling of obligation results from respect for
instruction. But as was shown {Language and Thought,
Chapter V) a child of 6 may ask many questions con-
cerning rules and inhibitions, whilst with children Irom
2 to 5 questions are repeatedly asked in the form : " Why
must we do that ? " — " Must we do this ? " — " Should it
be done like that ? " etc. Concern of this sort is evident
throughout the child's whole mentality, although it is well

^ Bovet, " Les conditions de I'obligation de conscience," Annee
Psychologique," Vol. XVill (1912).

248 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

before any need has arisen to explain the " why " of such
phenomena. Physical necessity is confused with moral
necessity ; natural law has a moral origin, and the power
of nature is regarded as of the type of compulsion a chief
exerts over his obedient subjects or that adults exert over
children. That this is a special factor of animism was
sufficiently shown in § 3 of this chapter : it is not because
the child beheves things to be alive that he regarded them
as obedient, but it is because he believes them to be
obedient that he regards them as alive.

In short, factors of the individual order and those of
the social order (the second being moreover an extension
of the first) meet in the formation and development of
child animism. To be complete, yet another factor must
be mentioned, which although not itself a cause of animism
is certainly of great importance in its systematisation :
this is the language of the environment.

This is so for two reasons. As M. Bally has put it,
language always lags in its aptitude for expression. That
is to say, when speaking in images we are always com-
pelled to draw on forms of expression that we have really
outgrown. For example, we say " the sun is trying to
break through the mist," which is an animistic and
dynamic way of speaking, and moreover takes no account
of the distance which in reaUty separates the sun from
the mist and suggests they are actually engaged in conflict.
It is therefore not to be wondered at that the child takes
hterally personifications of language (such as the French
" le soleil se couche "), finalistic expressions (such as " the
river is flowing to get to the lake "), anthropomorphic or
artificialist expressions (such as " the heat is making the
water boil," " the steam is trying to escape ") and even quasi-
magical expressions (such as " the clouds foretell rain ").
Adult language provides the very conditions necessary to
foster the child's animism and this the more so, since
generally speaking the child takes all metaphors hterally
— it looks to see " a broken arm " tumble on to the ground,
whilst the phrase "go to the devil " constituted, for a

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 249

child of 9 of our acquaintance, the proof that the devil
is not far off.

But it is obvious that in all these cases, language is not
the cause of child animism in general. It is simply the
cause of animism following one particular line — already
determined — rather than another. There is simply, as
Stem^ maintains, "convergence" between the regressive
tendencies of language and the child's natural trend of
mind. It is not the child which is moulded by language ;
it is the language which is already childish.

But this is not all. As was pointed out by W. Jerusalem ^
language itself, apart from this exceptional imagery,
" dramatises " the simplest judgments. The fact of
separating the subject from the verb and the predicate
leads the mind to substantialise the subject and to endow
it with an activity of its own and with distinct qualities,
as if the subject was something more than the sum of its
actions and the sum of its qualities. When, for example,
Ross (9 ; 9) says that the wind may not know what it is
doing " because it is not a person " but it none the less
must know that it is blowing " because it's it that blows,"
he is, in the most interesting way, putting his finger on
this very problem. To say of the wind "it's it that blows "
is in fact to make the wind into something that is both
active, material and permanent. It is to be thrice the
victim of words. By tolerating the expression " the
wind blows " or simply by speaking of the " wind " as if
it were a person, language perpetrates, in fact, the triple
absurdity of suggesting that the wind can be independent
of the action of blowing, that there can be a wind that does
not blow, and that the wind exists apart from its outward
manifestations. But it is so natural to us to talk in this
way that we regard it almost as correct. When we say
" cold fish calls for mayonnaise " we do not suppose that
the fish itself actually calls at all, but when we say " the
wind blows " we really beheve that " it " blows. This is

^ Die Kinder spy ache, Leipzig, 1907.

* Die Uriheilsf unction, Vienna and Leipzig, 1895, pp. 109-111.

250 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the explanation of Ross's reasoning. He is a materialist
without realising it, as are common sense and language
itself.

Such cases certainly favour Max Miiller's doctrine that
the animism of savages, together also with all religion, is
a "disease of language." Again, it is obvious that it is
simply a matter of convergence between language and
mentality, be it primitive or child. Thought creates
language and then passes beyond it, but language turns
on thought and seeks to imprison it.

To conclude, we have seen how complex is the genesis
of animism.. But it will have been noticed that, apart
from the verbal factor, the factors conditioning the
genesis of the child's animism are approximately those
conditioning the formation of feelings, of participation, and
of magical causation. Animism and participation are in
fact complementary phenomena, or are rather, the
independent phases of the same process of naturalising
reality. Three stages may be distinguished in the process.
During the first stage, the self and things are completely
confused ; there is participation between all and every-
thing, and desire can exert a magical activity over reality.
During the second stage, the self is differentiated from
things, but subjective aspects still adhere to things. The
self is now felt partially to participate with things and
believes itself capable of acting on them from a distance
because it regards the various instruments (words, images,
gestures, etc.) by means of which it thinks of things, as
inseparable from the things. Moreover, things are neces-
sarily animate, because since the self is not yet distin-
guished from things, psychical and physical ideas are not
yet dissociated. During this second stage, magic and
animism are therefore complementary. This is the period
when the child, believing itself to be followed by the sun
and the moon, can interpret the fact equally in terms of
magic (" it's I who make them move ") or of animism
(" it's they who follow me "). Finally, in a third stage,
the self is so far distinguished from things that the

THE ORIGINS OF CHILD ANIMISM 251

instruments of thought can no longer be conceived as
adherent in things, words are no longer in things, images
and thought are situated in the head. Gestures are no
longer effective. Magic is no more. But, as was shown
(Chapter II, § 8), the distinction between sign and thing
signified appears before that of internal and external and
above all before that of psychic and physical. In other
words, the distinction between the self and things may be
fairly advanced without the dissociation of subjective from
objective ideas having reached the point of causing
animism to disappear. During this third stage animism
therefore remains whilst magic tends to disappear.
Feelings of participation tend also to come to an end or
at any rate they assume the completely animist form of
simple communion between minds— thus according as the
child continues to believe the sun to be alive after giving
up the idea that it follows us, the sun will perhaps still
appear to him as concerned with our doings and desiring
our well-being, but this involves merely an intelhgible
relationship between one person and another. It is no
longer participation, strictly speaking, in the sense that
material participation is no longer possible. That animism
survives magic and in rationalising the primitive parti-
cipations comes to absorb them, is what will be .shown by
the cases quoted in the succeeding research on artificialism.
We may merely conclude for the moment tliat during the
primitive stage magic and animism arc both related and
complementary.

PART III

ARTIFICIALISM

We shall borrow the term artificialism from a study
which M. Brunschvicg has devoted to the physics of
Aristotle.^ According to M. Brunschvicg, two tendencies
whose real antagonism has been shown by stoic and
mediaeval physics came to converge in the peripatetic
system ; one of these leads Aristotle to regard all things
as the product of art, and of an art analogous to human
technique ; the other urges him to attribute to things,
internal forces and appetites similar to those possessed
by living beings. " Aristotle," says M. Brunschvicg,
"speaks alternately as a sculptor and as a biologist."^
To the first of these tendencies, that which leads to the
conception of things as resulting from a transcendent
act of " creation," M. Brunschvicg gives the name
" artificialism." The artificiaHsm of Aristotle is, to be
sure, learned and in keeping with the entire peripatetic
philosophy and in particular with the materialism of
the logic of classes. Moreover, this artificiahsm is im-
manent as much as transcendent : creative activity is
attributed to Nature (regarded, it is true, as baleful) just
as much as to a divine mover. Child artificiahsm, on thie
contrary, is more implicit than systematic and tran-
scendent rather than immanent : it consists in regarding
things cLS the product of human creation, rather than in
attributing creative activity to the things themselves.

^ L. Brunschvicg, L'expirience humaine et la causality physique,
livres V-VII.
* p. 140.

254 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

But here also, as in the case of animism, the name matters
but little. Provided we note clearly the differences
existing between child animism and Greek animism, it is
an advantage to use the same word in both cases to signify
the same tendency to confuse material causality and
human creation.

Still more, the conflict that M. Brunschvicg stresses
between the immanent dynamism of biology and the
transcendent dynamism of artificialism in the physics of
Aristotle, may perhaps correspond, on an obviously lower
reflective plane, to the duaUsm represented in the child
by animism and artificialism — which in consequence must
correspond to some very general tendency in the history
of human thought : things are regarded on one hand
as hving and on the other as created. The questions
now to be considered are whether this dualism in
the child's thought is primitive or merely derived,
whether it gives rise to contradiction or whether
there is a stage which involves both animism and
artificiaUsm ?

But child artificialism is much too intricate a pheno-
menon— both in its manifestations and in the psycho-
logical components lying at its root — for it to be possible
to give our research a systematic form. The course we
are compelled to follow is analytic much more than
synthetic, that is to say, that we shall study one after
the other the explanations which children give as to the
origins of the sun and moon, the sky, rivers, primitive
matter, mountains, etc., rather than trace the different
stages of artificialism throughout its history. The method
we shall follow has, moreover, certain advantages in that
it is not based on any prejudice concerning the homo-
geneity or above all the synchronism of the child's arti-
ficialist conceptions.

Further, we must make it clear that we shall deal
here only with children's ideas concerning origins and
take no account of ideas concerning the activity of things
or the cause of their movements. These last questions

ARTIFICIALISM 255

will form the subject of the sequel to this work (see
Causalite Physique) .

Finally, we must offer Sully a well-earned tribute for
having emphasised the existence and importance of child
artificiaHsm. According to him, " the one mode of origin
which the embryo thinker is really and directly familiar
with is the making of things." ^

^ See Sully, Studies oj Childhood, pp. 79, 127.

CHAPTER VIII

THE ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON

It may seem strange to ask children where the sun and
the moon and the stars come from. The idea of it did not
occur to us for a long while, and when it did we hesitated
to apply it for fear the children should think we were
making fun of them. As a matter of fact, however,
scarcely any question seems absurd to a child. To wonder
where the sun comes from is no stranger to him than to
speculate about rivers or clouds or smoke. This may
suggest that the children, on their part, are trifling with
the psychologists and that their rephes have no significant
correspondence with a real and spontaneous process of
thought in their minds. That this is not the case, we
think is borne out by the investigations which are now
to be recounted and which it is claimed bear evidence of
genuine spontaneity. Children's questions indicate a real
interest on their part in the sun and the stars, and the
very form in which they put the questions points to the
nature of the solution which they themselves are inchned
to favour. This point must be briefly examined for it is
very important not to corrupt the child's natural tend-
encies by means of inept tests.

It is only necessary to glance through a Hst of questions
put by children of from 3-5, to find examples hke this :
Fran (2 ; 5) asks " Who made the sun ? " The very form
of this question is artificiaUst. Stanley HaU quotes the
following examples : At 5 years of age, " Why is there a
moon ? " At 3^ years, " What makes the sun shine ? " and
" Who is it puts the stars in the sky at night? " At 5 years,
" Who is it makes the stars twinkle ? "

266

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 257

Furthermore, a spontaneous interest in the phases of
the moon is to be noticed which we shall see is related
to artificiahsm. At 5 years : " Why isn't the moon round
now when it is sometimes ? " At 9 years : " Why isn't the
moon always the same shape ? Why is it big sometimes and
little at others ? " and " What's the moon made of ? "

It is clear enough from these questions that there is
a tendency to consider the sun and moon as being made
by somebody and to find an originating cause for their
activities. The same thing is apparent in the following
instance : —

D'Estrella, one of the deaf-mutes quoted by W. James
(Chapter VII, § 10), recounts how he thought that the sun
was a ball of fire. At first he thought there were lots of
suns, one for each day. He did not understand how they
could rise or set. One evening he happened to see some
boys who were throwing up and catching string balls
which had been dipped in oil and lighted. This made
him think of the sun and he decided that it must have
been thrown up and caught in the same manner. But by
whom ? Then he supposed that there must be a tremend-
ously strong man hidden in some way behind the moun-
tains (the town of San Francisco is surrounded by moun-
tains). The sun was a ball of fire with which he played,
throwing it up very high in the sky every morning and
catching it again every evening. He supposed that God
{i.e. the very strong man) Ut the stars for his own use
just as we hght the gas.

When allowance had been made for the logical form
which d'Estrella gives his recollections, they correspond
in a striking degree to the replies which we are about to
analyse. What, in short, we have to do is to make the
questions we put to the children correspond to a certain
extent with some of the spontaneous questions which
they themselves ask. But if the results are to be con-
vincing, we must do still more. We must establish in
the replies given to our questions at different ages a
continuous development and this development must itself
follow a definitely marked curve or gradation. This is
precisely what the facts do show.

258 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

It is, in fact, possible to distinguish in the development
of conceptions relative to the origins of the sun and moon
three stages more or less clearly marked. During the
first, the child ascribes them to human agency (or divine,
but we shall see that this amounts practically to the
same thing). During the second stage an origin half
natural, half artificial is propounded ; they are due, for
instance, to the condensation of the clouds, but the clouds
themselves come from the roofs of houses or from the
smoke which is produced by men. Finally, during the
third stage, the child reaches the idea that human activity
has nothing to do with the origin of the sun. The child
invents a natural origin (condensation of the air, of the
clouds, etc.) or, less frequently, refuses to speculate on
the matter as being too difficult for him.

§ I. A Primitive Example of the First Stage. —
One of the most illuminating cases that we have obtained
is that of Roy, in which certain primitive characteristics
show well the original connection between animism and
artificiahsm. We quote it almost in its entirety : —

Roy (6; o) : "How did the sun begin? — It was
when life began. — Has there always been a sun ? — No. —
How did it begin ? — Because it knew that life had begun. —
What is it made of ? — Of fire. — But how ? — Because there
was fire up there. — Where did the fire come from ? — From
the sky. — How was the fire made in the sky ? — It was
lighted with a match. — Where did it come from, this match ?
— God threw it away." After a moment's pause : " What
is life ? — It is when one is alive. — What made life begin ?
— We did, when we started living."

Then after another interval and in connection with the
four quarters of the moon, Roy said : " The moon has
become a whole one. — How ? — Because it's grown. — How
does the moon grow ? — Because it gets bigger. — How does
that come about ? — Because we get bigger (Parce que nous
on grandit). — What makes it get bigger ? — It's the clouds.
(Roy said a little earlier that it is the clouds which cut
the moon and make it into a crescent : "It is the clouds
which have cut it.") — What do they do ? — They help it to
grow." " How did the moon begin ? — Because we began
to be alive. — What did that do ? — It made the moon get

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 259

bigger. — Is the moon alive ? — No . . . Yes. — Why ? —
Because we are alive. — How was it made ? — Because we
were made. — And that makes the moon get bigger ? — Yes.
— How ? . . . Why ? — It is the clouds that have made it
get bigger. — Is the sun alive ? — Yes. — Why ? — Because we
are alive. — Does it know when it's day ? — Yes. — How ?
— // can see that it's day."

Three weeks later we saw Roy again and made sure
that he had forgotten what we had previously talked
about. " How did the sun begin ? — With fire. — Where
did it come from ? — From a match. — How did the sun
get big ? — Because we get big. — Who makes the sun get
big ? — The clouds. — And we ? — It's because we eat. — Does
the sun eat ? — No. — How do the clouds make the sun
bigger ? — Because the clouds get bigger too." ^ " And how
did the moon begin ? — With fire 2'oo.— How did it get
bigger ? — Just like we get bigger. — Why did it get bigger ?
— Because the clouds made it get bigger. — How ? — Because
they get bigger too. — If there were no clouds would the moon
get bigger then ? — No . . . Yes. All the same it would be
able to, just like we do."

This case is worth studying closely, because it shows
extremely clearly how artificialism and animism arise
simultaneously out of the primitive participations that the
child estabhshes between things and man.

There are, in fact, three tendencies in Roy's thought :
(i) An artificiahst tendency ; the sun and moon have
been made by man. Their origin lies in the flame of a
match. (2) An animist tendency ; the sun and the moon
are alive, they know when it is day-time, and what we are
doing, etc. (3) A tendency to estabhsh participations
between them and ourselves ; they grow because we
grow, they began to live " because we were made "

1 In order to understand Roy's statements it should be noted that
in other conversations Roy has said : —

(a) It is the clouds which make the wind and vice versa (Chap. IX, § 7,

and CausalitS Physique, Chap. I).

(b) We are ourselves full of wind, which has at the same time some-

thmg to do with the clouds ; it is this wind \yhich makes us get
bigger [CausaliU Physique, Chap. II).

(c) In its origin the wind has come from men ; it is " somebody who

blew " (Causalite Physique, Chap. II).
One can distinguish here a system of participations.

26o CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

(" parce que nous, on s'est fait "), etc. Let us try to deter-
mine how far these three tendencies are primitive and
what are the relations existing between them.

First of all, it is clear that the artificialist myth accord-
ing to which the sun and moon come from the flame of
a match, is not so primitive as the feelings of participation
between the sun and moon and human beings ; it is the
myth which is derived from these feelings and not the
inverse. The myth is, in fact, more or less an effort of
invention. Roy made up the myth when pressed to
define the origins but his spontaneous thought was satis-
fied with a much vaguer relation between the sun and
man. This relation amounted to no more than this, that
man in coming to life thereby provoked the same sort of
activity in the sun and moon. This does not constitute
an idea that the sun was actually made by man, it simply
indicates a participation between them and it was only
when Roy was asked to define this participation more
exactly that he had recourse to frank artificialism, that
is to the myth of their origin in human construction.

The same is true with animism. In Roy's view the sun
and moon " grow," they are conscious, alive, etc. But there
are no grounds for supposing that this animism is prior
to the feelings of participation Roy experiences ; the sun
and moon grow because we grow, they are aUve because
we are alive, etc. The relations between animism and
participation have been sufficiently discussed in earlier
chapters and it is not necessary to return to them here.
The notion of participation leads to that of animism and
by nature precedes it, though animism may subsequently
react on participation by confirming and consolidating it.

It seems then that the impressions of participation
that Roy experiences are at the root of the other mani-
festations of his thought. But what are these partici-
pations ? To say that the moon grows bigger " because
we get bigger," that it is alive " because we are alive," is
to use formulae which, in the first instance, express simple
images or comparisons, without concern as to a causal

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 261

explanation. As far as Roy is concerned it is also a habit
of speech which he used to reply to other questions ; as
for example, the wind goes along " because we go along,"
and the sun does not try to go away " because sometimes
we don't try to." But the study we have made of the
beUef that the sun and moon follow our movements has
shown clearly enough (Chapter VII, § 2) that a heavenly
body which moves " when we move " moves as a result
of our movement. Still further, when Roy claims that
the moon came into being " because we began to Uve "
and that " that made the moon grow bigger," or again
when Roy affirms that even without the help of the clouds,
the moon would have grown because of us, it seems that
he has in view not merely analogy but genuine causaUty.
Analogy may enter into Roy's reasoning, but only inas-
much as analogy and causality are always confused by
children still in the stage of " precausality," that is to
say where the logical or the moral is confused with the
physical.

It may be that the impressions of participation to which
the question of the origins of the sun and moon give rise
are to be explained as follows. When Roy said that they
began to exist " when Ufe began " and " because we
began to be alive " it seems that he might have been
thinking in more or less vague terms of the origin of
babies and that his ideas on the origin of things might be
a function of his ideas on the birth of human beings.
Roy, like many children, has perhaps begun to wonder
where babies come from, and from that to ask himself
questions as to the origins of things, with the implicit
tendency to relate the birth of things to that of men.
We shall see subsequently some examples of artificialist
interests originating and developing along these lines-
We must first inquire what are the ideas of children on
the origin of babies. Their first impression is of a con-
nection between babies and parents : they feel that the
latter play an essential part in the arrival of the baby —
either that they have bought, found or otherwise obtained

262 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

it. Finally, they invent an explanation for their con-
viction, namely, that the parents have made it. In this
case the feeling of a connection precedes the myth and
actually gives rise to it.

Whatever may be thought of this particular proposition,
whose accuracy may be judged by what follows, we can
understand the true relations existing between Rov's
feehngs of participation, animism and artificialism ; the
foundation of them is in the feehngs of participation, and
it is when the child seeks to systematise these feelings
that he has recourse to animistic and artificiahst myths.

Thus, on the one hand, Roy, when urged to define
the contents of his participations which seem to partake
of the character both of analogy and of causahty, fell back
on animist explanations. For example, speaking of the
clouds, he replied : —

" Can we make the clouds grow bigger ? — No. — Why
do they grow bigger ? — Because we grow bigger (Roy
admits thus what he has just denied). — Why do you
gro\y bigger ? — Because I eat. — Does that make the clouds
bigger too ? — No, they grow because they know that we do."
And after a moment : " How did the clouds start ? —
Because we were growing. — Is it we who make them grow
bigger ? — No, it isn't us, but the clouds know we are growing."

In other words, the universe is a society of like beings
living according to a well-ordered code of rules ; every
analogy is at the same time a logical relationship since
analogy signifies common or interacting purposes and
every purpose is a cause. One even feels that, for Roy,
the members of this universe necessarily imitate each
other so that when we grow the moon and the clouds
are forced to follow suit. Clearly, when Roy is made to
define his ideas his participations develop into animistic
explanations.

But, on the other hand, in this universe consisting of a
society of living beings, Roy gives the first place to man
(or alternatively to God, which amounts to the same
since he conceives God as a " gentleman " who hghts

ORIGIN or THE SUN AND MOON 263

matches and throws them away). The sun, moon, clouds,
etc., were brought into being by the appearance of man.
It is man's growth which stimulates growth in things,
etc. Here actually lies the difference between partici-
pations of the artificialist type and those of the animist
type. Though they are different they are not contra-
dictory but complementary. ArtificiaUsm is then, in its
simplest form, the tendency to believe that human beings
control the creation and conduct of other beings which
are regarded as being in some degree alive and conscious.
But here, as in animism, when the child is invited to be
precise, he invents a myth. In the case of artificialism
the myth consists of a fiction whereby man has created
matter. The myth of the match in which the sun origin-
ates, marks a pronounced stage in artificialism, inasmuch
as Roy now provides the details of the process of creation
whereas hitherto he has limited himself to the simple
conviction that such a process existed. But, from the
very outset, artificiahsm is mingled with the feelings of
participation which the child experiences, not so much
between his self and things, but rather, between his
parents or adults in general and the world of matter.

To conclude, Roy's artificiahsm comes, like his animism,
from his feehngs of participation and without any contra-
diction with animism. They are, considered separately,
two complementary systematisations of the same feehngs
of participation.

§ 2. The First Stage : the Sun and Moon are made
Artificially. — Roy's case has led us to certain hyjx)-
theses which wiU serve as the main thread in our research.
In the following more developed cases the artihcialist
myths stand out more clearly from the primitive partici-
pations.

Purr (8 ; 8) : " What is a crescent (croissant de lune) ?
— The moon has cut itself up. — How ? Does it cut itself
up or is it something else that does it ? — It is the moon
that does it. — On purpose ? — No, it is when it is born, it is
quite small. — Why ? — It can't he big at first. It's like us

264 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

when we are little babies. It does just the same. — When
there's a crescent is it always the same moon ? — Some-
times it's the same, sometimes it's another. — How many
are there ? — Lots. So many that you can't count them.
The moon is of fire too. — Why is it cut up ? — So as to be
able to shine in more than one place. ... ( = it cuts itself
up in order to shine at the same time in different places).
Where does it come from ? — From the sky. — How did it
begin ? — It came from Heaven. It was born from God (!)
— And the sun. — It was born from God too.

Jacot (6^) beheves that the sun is of fire : " How did
it begin ? — It was quite tiny. — Where does it come from ?
— From Heaven. — How did it begin in the sky? — Always
getting bigger." Jacot says that the sun is ahve and
conscious. It has grown Uke a Uving thing. It was made
by human beings.

Gaud (6 ; 8) : " What is the moon Uke ? — Round.
Sometimes there is only half of it. — Why is there only half
of it ? — Because that is how it starts. — Why ? — Because
there is a lot of daylight (he means that the moon remains
small during the day and only grows at night). — Where
is the other half ? — That's because it's not finished, not
absolutely finished. — What does it make itself like ? —
Round. — How does it begin ? — Quite small : then it keeps
on getting bigger. — Where does it come from ? — From
Heaven. — How does it make itself ? — Quite tiny. — Does
it make itself aU alone ? — No, God does it. — How ? —
With his hands." Gaud adds that the moon is alive and
conscious. It deliberately follows us about, etc. The
sun is equally alive and has been made.

Moc (lo ; 2, backward) is a very curious case because
of his affective reactions. He says about the sun : " It
used to be quite small, then it got big." He assigns life and
consciousness to it. But to the question " where does
it come from ? " he is seized with embarrassment, blushes
violently, turns his head away, and finally, in great
discomfort says that the sun comes from " the person
who has made it come. — What do you mean ? — From the
person who made it. — Who was he ? A man ? — Yes. —
Was it really a man or was it God ? — Oh ! God or a
man, or someone." The cause for this embarrassment is
certainly not to be found in the difficulty of the problem
for it was clear that Moc had a solution in his mind but
it was one which he shrank from confessing. It was no
sort of reUgious compunction, for during the whole con-

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 265

versation Moc was, without systematic preference, ready
to regard God or " man " indifferently as the author of
any particular phenomenon. The only explanation of
his embarrassment is that he is upset when he is spoken
to about birth. He must have been told that everything
to do with birth is taboo and the questions concerning
the sun seemed to him of a shocking nature. For this
reason it was not possible to proceed further with his
examination. Such a case shows how intimately animism
and artificiahsm may be connected.

In the foregoing cases one can see that the children
identify the advent of the sun and moon with the birth
of a living being it being granted, naturally, that the child
conceives such a birth as a sort of manufacture whose
process is not precisely understood but which is in essence
the construction of something living. In any case, the
children whose replies are recorded above speak of the
growth of the heavenly bodies, as if the sun and moon
began by being tiny like babies.

The following children, on the contrary, try to define
the manner in which the manufacture took place though
sometimes this manufacture is still identified with a birth.
Also, as we shall see, the children continue to consider
the sun and the moon as being aUve and conscious ;
animistic and artificiaHst tendencies are still complement-
ary to each other : —

Caud (9:4): " How did the sun start ? — With heat. —
What heat ? — From the fire. — Where is the fire ? — In
Heaven. — How did it start ? — God lit it with wood and
coal. — Where did he get the wood and coal ? — He made it.
— How did the fire make the sun }■ — The fire is the sun."
Up to now it seems that Caud is no longer animistic but
this is not so: "Does the sun see us? — No. — Does it
feel the heat ? — Yes. — Does it see at night ? — No. — Does
it see in the day ? — Yes, of course ! It sees because it makes
the light for itself."

Fran (9) : " How did the sun begin ? — It was a big
ball. — How did it begin ? — By getting bigger and bigger
and then afterwards they told it to go up in the air. It is like
a balloon. — Where did this ball come from ? — / think it is
a great stone. I believe it is made of a great ball of it. — Are

266 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

you sure of all that ? — Yes, sure.— How did it get made ?
— They made it into a big ball. — Who did ? — Some men."
At the same time Fran thinks that the sun sees us and
deliberately follows us. On the other hand, the identi-
fication of the sun with a stone is not contradictory with
the assertion that the sun has grown, for we shall see that
a great number of children believe that stones grow in
the earth. Here again are artificialism and animism
closely related.

As to the moon, Fran, like many other children, believes
that it is the same object as the sun but that on account
of the night it loses its brightness : the moon " is the sun.
But when it is dark there can't be any sunshine." It is true
that the moon is bigger. But that is " because it has to
brighten up the darkness. It has to be bigger because very
often people come home in the dark and then the sun ( = the
moon) shines."

Deb (9) : " How did the sun start ? — With matches. —
How did that make the sun ? — From the flames. — Where
did the matches come from ? — From home." None the
less he beheves the sun to be living and conscious.

Gall (5) was born in 1918, which perhaps has some
bearings on his cosmogony : " Where did the sun come
from ? — It came in the war. — How did it begin ? — When
the war ended. — Has there always been a sun ? — No. —
How did it begin ? — A little ball came. — And then ? — It
grew big. — Where did this httle ball come from ? — From
the fire."

Here is a case which is intermediate between the last
cases and those of the second stage in the sense that the
child begins to perceive the possibility that the sun and
moon may have come from the clouds. But, in particular
aspects, the idea becomes swamped by considerations Hke
those in the preceding cases : —

Hub (6|) : " Has the sun always been there ? — No, it
began. — How ? — With fire. . . .—How did that start ? —
With a match. — How ?— // was lighted. — How did that
happen ?—By striking the match.— \<\\o struck it ? — A
man. — What was his name ?— / don't know." The moon
was made "in Heaven " that is to say " in the clouds. —
How were the clouds able to make the moon ? — Because
it is lighted.— VJhsii is 7— The cloud.— How 7— With fire.
— Where does this fire come from ? — Frotn the match."

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 267

" What lit it ? — A bit of stick with a red thing at the end."
Hub is thinking here of the rockets sold on gala nights ;
the moon for him is a cloud set alight by rockets fired
off by people. The origin of the clouds also is artificial :
" Where do the clouds come from ? — From the sky. —
How did they start 1—In smoke.- — Where does the smoke
come from ? — From stoves. — Does smoke make the moons
then ? — Yes."

As regards the stars, the explanations given in the
first stage are the same as those we have just met with in
regard to the sun and moon.

J AC (6^) supposes that the stars are on fire and that
they arc made by people.

GiAMB [S^]. The stars are to show what the weather
will be like : "If there are stars it is going to be fine ;
when there are none it is going to rain." They are " made
of light. — Where does this light come from ? — // is the
lamp-posts outside which light them up, which makes them
come." " How did they start ? — A man made them. — Do
they know that they are shining ? — Yes."

Fran (9) : " People took little stones and made them into
little stars.

Grang {y\) : What are the stars ? — Round things. —
Made of what ? — Made of fire." It is God who made
them.

The reason for this artificialism lies evidently in the
finalistic attitude which makes all children believe that
the function of the stars is to indicate the weather. They
serve " to show if it will be fine to-morrow " (Caud, 9:4).
" What are the stars ? — They are to show if the next day
will be fine " (Ceres, 9).

It is not necessary to multiply examples. Let us
examine briefly the significance of these facts before
describing the second and third stages. It is clear that
the detail, that is, the variation between one child and
another can be regarded as romancing. But the central
idea, that is the belief that the stars are made by man
must be considered as a spantaneous mental impulse on
the part of the child. For all that, there are two questions
to be asked in connection with the homogeneity of this
first stage.

268 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

In the first place, the existence of two groups of children
has been observed, namely, those who speak of the
" birth " of the sun, without defining the manner of this
birth and those who describe with some measure of pre-
cision the way in which the sun is made. It would appear
that this constitutes two stages. But, on the one hand,
there seems to be no dividing line of age between these
two groups and, on the other, the children of both groups
maintain that the sun and the moon are hving and con-
scious. From the evidence in hand one is justified only
in seeing two types of rephes characteristic of the one
stage and having really the same meaning, it being re-
membered that the manufacture of the sun with a match
or a stone or with smoke is by no means incompatible
with the conception which children of this age have of
the birth of a living being. Unfortunately, we can only
put this forward as an hypothesis without directly verify-
ing it on our children, since it would be most indiscreet
and dangerous from the pedagogical standpoint to ques-
tion these children on the problem of the birth of human
beings or even of animals.

A second question may be raised. Sometimes the
children attribute the making of the planets to the God
of their catechism and sometimes simply to " a man."
Does this mean two types or two stages ? We shall see
later, when we come to discuss the ideas of M. Bo vet on
the genesis of rehgious feeling, that on broad lines one can
distinguish the following evolution. The child begins by
attributing the distinctive qualities of the divinity —
especially omniscience and almightiness — to his parents
and thence to men in general. Then, as he discovers the
hmits of human capacity, he transfers to God, of whom
he learns in his religious instruction, the qualities which
he leams to deny to men. On broad lines, then, there
should be two periods, one of human artificialism and the
other of divine artificialism. However, we do not believe
that this distinction is a useful one at this juncture and
particularly in connection with this question of the origin

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 269

of the planets. The fact is that too many adult influences
supervene likely to upset the spontaneous conceptions of
the child and a gradation corresponding clearly to a definite
age is not observable.

This last circumstance raises a very serious difficulty,
on the solution of which the whole question of child
artificiaHsm turns. Is this artificiaHsm spontaneous or
are the child's conception of the origins of things to be
attributed to its religious training ?

As far as those phenomena are concerned which we
shall study shortly (origins of clouds, rivers, mountains,
stones, etc.) the question hardly arises or, at all events,
takes another form, for we shall see a native artificiaHsm
in play of a kind so evidently spontaneous that the in-
fluence of religious instruction clearly counts for httle. But
where the sun and the moon and the stars are concerned
a strong influence may be at work ^ since the planets are
much nearer in association to a God Uving in Heaven
than are the material objects located on the earth. But,
in our opinion, religious instruction has influenced only
a section of the children under our observation and even
among those whose artificiaHsm is thus qualified it is
limited to intensifying a tendency towards artificiaHsm
already preexisting in the child and not created by it.

On the one hand, our statistics indicate that children
of the first stage attribute the making of the planets to
man as often as to God. One might comment on this
that the religious instruction may have been miscompre-
hended, that the child has transferred to men that which
was averred of God, or that imagination, stirred by teach-
ing, has added to the data. One finds, however, that
before any religious teaching has taken place, artificialist
questions are being framed by children of 2 to 3 years old.
' Who made the sun ? " asked Fran at 2 years 9 months.
Furthermore, if religious teaching is to be held responsible
for the artificiaHsm of children of four to six years of age,
it wiU be agreed that in order to account for the deforma-

^ See Genesis i. 14-18.

270 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

tion which has been observed there must be a powerfuJ
natural inclination in the child to refer the making of
material objects to man. The idea of the " birth " and
the growing up of the planets, the belief that the four
quarters of the moon are made afresh with each new
moon or that they result from some artificial dissection
of the moon, the notions concerning matches, flaming
stones, rockets which set fire to clouds, etc., are so clearly
manifestations of this tendency that they must surely be
recognised as spontaneous. Finally, the facts quoted by
W. James^notably the recollections of infancy of the
deaf-mute, d'Estrella — indicate sufficiently that spon-
taneous artificialism can exist in the child.

On the other hand, even where we can trace distinctly
the influences of religious teaching we can see that it is
not positively accepted by the child but is assimilated
in an original form. This being the case, there must have
pre-existed a spontaneous tendency towards artificialism
which is the sole explanation of the distortion which the
teaching undergoes. The following is a good example of
artificialist belief stimulated by religious teaching, but in
which the information imparted to the child has been
seriously disfigured by his own contribution to it : —

Gava (8^) : The sun is ahve because " it keeps coming
back. — Does it know when the weather is fine ? — Yes,
because it can see it. — Has it eyes ? — Of course ! When it
gets up it looks to see if it is bad weather and if it is it goes
off somewhere else where it's fine. — Does it know that it's
called the sun ? — Yes, it knows that we like it. It is very
nice of it to make us warm. — Does it know its name ? —
/ don't know. But sometimes it must hear us talking and
then it will hear names and then it will know." AU this
seems to be pure romancing, but as we shall see Gava
almost identifies the sun with God : " When your daddy
was little was there a sun then ? — Yes, because the sun
was born before people so that people would be able to live. —
How did it start ? — // was made in Heaven. It was a person
who died and then ivent to Heaven. In Sunday School he is
called God. — Where did this person come from ? — From
inside the earth. — Where from ?— / don't know how he was

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 271

made. — How did that make the sun ? — The person was
very red and that made the light. Even in the morning before
the sun is out, it is light all the same." In other words this
person (Jesus Christ) has set fire to Heaven and this Hght
made the sun. Gava is thinking probably of Christ's halo.
He went on to tell us of a picture in which God was like
the sun but with arms and legs ! " What is the sun made
of ? — It's a big red ball. — Made of what ? — Of cloud . . .
I don't know. — Did it start a long while ago ? — Since there
have been people.— ^oi before ? — No, because there wouldn't
have been anything to light. — Did it start at the same time
as people or after ? — It started as soon as there were little
children. — Why ? — So that children should have the fresh
air. — If you were to speak to the sun would it hear ? —
Yes, when you say your prayers. — Do you say your prayers
to it ? — Yes. — Who told you to do that ? — At Sunday
School I was told always to say my prayers to it."

This remarkable example throws light on the three
following cases : —

KuF (10 ; i) said that the sun moves because something
pushes it. " Is it in it or outside, this something ? —
Inside. — What is it ? — It is God."

One of our research workers remembers clearly having
associated God with the sun for some years, either believing
that God lived in or behind the sun, or else conceiving them
as participating one with another. Every time she said
her prayers in the evening she thought of the sun and in
particular of the gap between two of the peaks in the
Bernese Alps which were visible from her room and in
which the sun used to set in winter.

One of our collaborators remembers taking a walk
with his father in the course of which they watched the
sun setting. The father observed that it was only through
the sun that we were all able to live. The child had a
sudden revelation that the sun was something to do with
God. He decided finally that though his father did not
go to Church, etc., it was because he worshipped the sun
or was bound to the sun by ties of reverence more strongly
than he was to God.

Such facts are very instructive. They reveal first of
all how far adult instruction can be disfigured by the
personal manner in which the child assimilates it, and,

272 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

furthermore, they reveal what are the laws of this assimi-
lation. There are, in fact, three tendencies at the roots
of these disfigurations and these three tendencies are
(jomplementary. The first is the tendency to consider
the planets as participating with mankind and with his
will. As examples of participations with human will, or
active participations, Gava considers the sim to originate
in the need of himian beings for hght or perhaps in the
need for providing fresh air for httle children, and our
collaborator, mentioned above, considered the sun and his
father as being bound together very closely by bonds of
submission, commandment or protection. As examples
of more material participations there are the three children
already quoted who considered the sun as being more or
less identical with God, whilst at the same time differing
from him, as in the case of the deaf-mute quoted by
James, who identified the moon with his own mother.
(Chapter III, § 15.) These participations expand, in the
first place, into artificiaUst myths. For example, Gava
thinks the sun has come from Christ's halo. Later they
expand into animism— as that the sun is living, con-
scious, and endowed with will. In short, rehgious in-
instruction is not received passively by the child but is
disfigured and assimilated in conformity with three
tendencies existing prior to this instruction. These latter
are, precisely, the tendency to invent participations, the
tendency towards artificialism and the tendency towards
animism, whose significance has already been studied.

We may thus conclude our analysis of the first stage
by saying that the integral artificialism indicated therein
is fundamentally spontaneous, though in certain cases it
may be influenced by the education imparted by adults
as far as concerns the detail of the child's conceptions.
In neither case, however, is there contradiction between
this artificiahsm and animism.

§ 3. The Second and the Third Stages : the
Origin of the Sun and Moon is first partly, then
COMPLETELY, NATURAL. — The best proofs of the spontane-

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 273

ous nature of the child's artificialist conceptions is their
continuity and the gradual manner in which they dis-
appear. Children of 10 to 11 years arrive independently
at the idea that the planets have a natural origin, and
between this third stage and the first there exists a series
of intermediate cases.

The intermediary cases constitute the second stage,
the children who belong to this stage attributing to the
planets an origin that is half artificial and half natural.
In the majority of cases (that is to say, where the beliefs
are spontaneous) the planets are held to have been made
by a natural process but from substances of artificial
origin. Thus, for example, the planets have come natur-
ally from the clouds, but the clouds are made of the smoke
from chimneys. In other cases, more or less influenced
by adult instruction, planets are said to be the fire of
volcanoes or mines, mankind having played some part in
their formation. We may commence with these latter
explanations which are the least interesting since adult
instruction has played some part, even if only indirectly,
in their formation.

Font (6 ; 9) says that the sun is conscious, it is made
of fire and it comes "from the mountain. — Where from ? —
From the mines. — What is it ? — People go looking for coal
in the ground." As to the moon : " // was made by the sun.
— How ? — With the fire from the mountain. — Where does
the moon come from ? — From the mountain. — What was
there in the mountain ? — The sww— Where does the sun
come from ? — From the mountain. — How did it begin ?
— With fire. — And how did this fire begin ? — With matches.
— And how did the mountain begin ? — With the earth
. . . It was people who made it."

Font illustrated his statement by a drawing showing
half a moon coming out of a mountain.

Marsal (mentally deficient) said : " / thought perhaps
that the sun came out of volcanoes. When they were in
eruption it made a ball of fire." The original thing about
Marsal is that he beheved that human help was necessary
to send the sun up in the air. It was " our ancestors "
who threw the sun up in the air " like a balloon."

274 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

The principle of these explanations is quite clear. The
child starts with two observed facts, namely, that the
planets come from behind the mountain and that they
are like fire. The sjoithesis of making the fire come from
the mountain follows. If he has been taught about them
the child will think of coal-mines or of volcanoes. He
adds to this (and it is here that these examples show them-
selves to be of the second stage, and not of the third) the
idea that men have played a necessary part in the genesis
of the planets. It is men who have made the mine or who
have sent the sun into the air.

Here are some examples of a type of reply, that is both
more ordinary and more interesting, for the influence of
instruction is not yet felt : —

GiAMB (8J) is stiU in the first stage as far as the
stars are concerned, but already in the second as far as
the sun and the moon are concerned : " How did the sun
begin ? — It was a big cloud that made it. — Where did this
cloud come from ? — From the smoke. — And where did the
smoke come from ? — From houses. — How did this cloud
make the sun ? — They stuck to each other until they became
round. — Are the clouds making the sun now ? — No, because
it's already made. — How did the clouds make the sun
shine ? — It's a light which makes it shine. — What Ught ?
— A big light, it is someone in Heaven who has set fire to
it." It can be seen how Giamb invokes an artificiahst
myth as soon as he is embarrassed. What follows will
show that he is ready to replace this myth by an ex-
planation according to which the smoke flamed up in
order to light the sun. " What is the sun made of ? — Of
stone. — And the clouds ? — They are made of stone as well.
— Why doesn't the stone fall down ? — No, it's the smoke
from houses. — Then the sun is made of stone and smoke
at the same time ? — No, nothing but smoke." (One feels
that Giamb holds to these two explanations at the same
time ; he is about to abandon the one according to which
the sun is a stone which somebody has set fire to, and he
is on the point of adopting definitely the other according
to which the sun is a cloud of flaming smoke.) " How do
the clouds make the sun bum ? — It's the smoke which
m,akes it burn because there is fire in the smoke." The sun
is conscious and deUberately follows us about. (See

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 275

Giamb's case — Chapter VII, § 11.) After an interval
he was asked : " What is the moon hke ? — Yellow. —
What is it made of ? — Of cloud. — Where does this cloud
come from ? — From the smoke when it gets yellow. —
Where does this smoke come from ? — From the stove,
sometimes when it is cold the smoke becomes yellow." (This
is true that in winter smoke has a yeUow-greenish tint.)
" How does the smoke make the moon ? — The chimney
smokes and it is sometimes yellow, sometimes white."

Gava (8^), who is in the first stage as far as the
sun is concerned, belongs to the second stage for his
explanation of the quarters of the moon : "It was made
by the air. — How was that ? — Perhaps it was clouds
which had not melted away and then they made a big
round thing." The air and the clouds are practically the
same thing for Gava. A few months later he was asked :
" What is the moon made of ? — Perhaps it is clouds, the
clouds were small and then they were squeezed together and
that made a ball. — Has there been a mOon for a long while ?
— Since things began living " {cp. Roy, see §1). " How did
the moon begin ? — First of all it was quite tiny then it grew,
it's other clouds which have come. — Where did they come
from ? — It was the steam which went up into the sky when
things were being cooked. — Is the moon ahve ? — It must be
because it comes back every evening."

Brul (8^) : " What is the sun made of ? — Of clouds.
— How did it begin ? — It began by being a ball. — Where
did this ball come from ? — From the clouds. — What are
the clouds made of ? — Of smoke. — Where does this smoke
come from ? — From the houses."

\ Lug (12 ; 3) : " How did the sun start ? — It started
with fire. — What fire ? — From the fire in the stove. — What
is there in the stove ? — Smoke. — Well, how did it happen ?
— The smoke went up and then it began, it caught fire. —
Why did it catch fire ? — Because it was very warm."
When asked if he were sure of all this, he replied : " Not
quite. — What is the sun ? — A great ball of fire. — How did
it begin ? — (After long reflection) With smoke. — What
smoke ?—From houses." He gave the same explanation
for the moon.

These explanations are very interesting because of their
spontaneous characters, they start from true observation,
that is, that the moon by day when it is white and spotted
with shadows looks hke a httle cloud. The resemblance

276 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

is particularly striking when one only sees a half-moon,
that is, when according to a child, the moon is in the act of
making itself. Since children of this stage (8 to 9 years
on an average) assert that clouds come from smoke, the
origin of the sun and moon seems quite clear to them.

As to stars, children of this stage explain them in the
same manner or else they suppose them to have come from
the sun or the moon as do children of the third stage.

Between the second and the third stage, there is a com-
plete continuity. If that part of the explanation be
cancelled according to which the clouds are said to issue
from the chimneys, an entirely natural explanation of the
origin of the sun and moon is left, and it is this explana-
tion which is given in the third stage. This we find, on
the average, after the ages of 9-1 1, though sometimes
earher. Here are some typical examples. The sun and
moon have come from the clouds and the clouds them-
selves are compressed air or steam : —

Not (10 ; 0) : " What is the sun made of ? — Of
flames. — Where do these flames come from ? — From the
sun. — How did they begin, did something make them ?
— They made themselves. — How ? — Because it was warm. —
How did they begin ? — The sun was made of flames of fire.
— How ? — Because it was warm. — Where ?^In the sky. —
Why was it warm ? — Lt was the air." The sun then is
the product of incandescent air, and according to Not,
the moon is also made of air.

Re (8|) : " How did the sun begin? — It came. — How?
— Because it moved. — Where did it come from ? — From
the Jura. — What is the sun made of ? — There are. lots
of little clouds. — What are clouds made of ? — They are
all squeezed together. — Where did these clouds come
from when the sun began ? — From the sky. — What are
the clouds ? — It's when there are lots of red things (the little
red sunset clouds). — Where ? — On the Jura." Re claims
to have seen these clouds in the evening, and it is true
that from Geneva one sees the sunset over the Jura. As
to the moon : " How did it begin ? — In a round thing. —
A round thing made of what ? — Of little red clouds. — Where
did the clouds come from ? — From the Jura. — And before
that ? — From the mountain." Re does not think that

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 277

the clouds have anything to do with smoke. They made
themselves alone in the sky which itself is made " of blue
clouds." He regards the sun and moon as both living
and conscious in spite of the quite natural manner of their
formation.

Chal (9:5): " How did the sun begin ? — (Thought-
fully) First it was small, then it got big. — Where did this
little sun come from ? — It must have been made by the
clouds. — What is the sun made of ? — Of air." As to the
clouds they also come from the air.

AuD (9 ; 8) : " What is the sun made of ? — Of clouds. —
How did the sun begin ? — To begin with, it was a ball and
then it caught fire." The clouds from which the sun was
born also came from the sky, the sun is, therefore, " a
cloud from the sky."

Ant (8|) : " How did the moon begin ? — The stars
ran into each other, and that made the moon. — And where
do the stars come from ? — They are flames which have
always been there from the beginning."

Gerv (ii) : " The sun and the moon are the same thing,
when the sun sets it makes the moon which shines during
the night." The moon seems to Gerv bigger than the
sun : " When the sun sets Fve seen it get much bigger (in
order to change itself into the moon)." Gerv was asked if
he had never seen the sun and the moon together during
the day, he said he had, but that it was an illusion. What
seems to be the moon is just a white shape, and is only
the reflection of the sun on the sky. As to the origin of
the sun, Gerv said : " The moon ( = the sun) is made of rays
of light heaped up together and that makes the moon. Some-
times it's big, sometimes it's small, according to the month.
It must be made of fire."

All these cases reveal a remarkable effort to explain
the sun and moon in terms of atmospheric condensation
or of clouds, and by the spontaneous combustion of these
condensed bodies. Making allowance for circumstances,
one can see the likeness between these conceptions and
the theories of the pre-Socratic thinkers.

The foregoing cases seem to embrace only information
that has been observed and acquired entirely by the child.
The following cases, on the other hand, embody information
due to contact with adults : —

278 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Mart and Schm have learned that electricity is " a
current," and that there is electricity in clouds.

Jean, Ant, etc., have learned that there was fire in the
earth and that this fire finds its way out through volcanoes,
etc. These children draw from such knowledge their
explanations of the origin of the sun and moon, which are
consequently partly and indirectly influenced by adults.
They must be quoted for they contain elements of original
reflection which are of the same type as the explanation
in terms of atmospheric condensation and of clouds.

Mart (9:5): " How did the sun begin ? — / don't know,
it's not possible to say. — You are right there, but we can
guess. Has there always been a sun ? — No. It's the elec-
tricity which has always been growing more and more. —
Where does this electricity come from ? — From under the
earth, from water. — What is electricity ? — It's the current."
" Can a current of water make electricity ? — Yes. — What
is this current made of }—It's made of steam." (Steam,
electricity and current seem to him to be all the same
thing.) " How did the electricity make the sun ? — It is
current which has escaped. — -How has it grown ? — It's the
air which has stretched, the electricity has been made bigger
by the air."

Schm (8 ; 8) : " How did the sun begin ? — With fire,
it's a ball of fire which gives light. — Where does the fire
come from ? — From the clouds. — How does that happen ?
— It's electricity in the clouds. — Do you think that some-
body made the sun ? — No, it came all alone." The sun is
ahve and conscious.

It will be seen that these cases, apart from the language
used are very similar to the preceding ones : for Mart,
the sun is burning air, and for Schm it is a glowing cloud.

Two cases follow in which the sun is said to have come
out of volcanoes or out of the earth : —

Jean (8 ; 6) : " How did the sun begin ? — In a ball of
fire. — Where did it come from ? — From the earth. — How
did that happen ? — It went up in steam. — Where did it
come from ? — Out of the ground."

Ant (8|) : " It (the sun) came out of the earth. —

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 279

How did that happen ? — A flame came out of the earth
and that made the sun. — Are there flames in the earth ? —
Yes. — Where are they ? — In volcanoes."

In these cases acquired knowledge has been used, but
in an original way which at all events shows the tendency
of children of this stage to explain the origin of the sun
and moon in an entirely natural process.

Let us now pass to explanations of the origin of the
stars. Children of the third stage in thinking of the stars
instinctively seek similar natural explanations, as a result
the stars are said to be emanations of the moon or of
hghtning, etc.

Tacc (9:7): " What are the stars ? — They are made of
fire. — How does that happen ? — They are little sparks which
have collected together and made a star." These sparks come
from a fire in the sky, and the fire " came all by itself."

Deb (9 ; 0) : " What are the stars ? — Little hits of
lightning. — What is lightning ? — It comes when there is
thunder. — What makes the lightning ? — When two clouds
meet each other."

Stoeck (ii ; o) : " How did the stars begin ? — With
the sun."

Marc (9 ; 5) : " Where did the stars come from ? —
From the sun."

Of course, a child is not necessarily in the third stage
at the same time for the stars, the sun and the moon.
In general, it seems that a natural explanation of the stars
is the first to appear.

Observation seems to show that the more advanced
children are, the less easily they formulate a hypothesis
on the origin of the sun and moon. It is only for the little
ones that everything is quite simple. Between 11 and
12, a child very often rephes " It isn't possible to say,"
or " I have no idea," etc. Artificialism, even when it has
become immanent, as in the third stage where constructive
activity is withdrawn from man to be attributed to nature
itself, leads thus to a crisis and a tentative agnosticism
succeeds an over-audacious cosmogony.

It should be observed that up to the end animism is

28o CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

intimately connected with artificialism. Children of the
third stage are very interesting in this respect. About
half of them are no longer animistic at all whereas more
than three-quarters of the children of the second stage
were still so. Natural explanations have destroyed their
belief in the consciousness of the planets. As to the other
half of the children they remain animistic but their
animism is in some degree submerged. The planets are
no longer concerned with us, they no longer follow us,
etc., but they remain conscious of their own movements.
Finally, in certain cases, one can see the disappear-
ance of an animism which is explicitly bound up with
artificialism.

BoucH (ii ; lo), for example, is a sceptical chUd who
complains of having been deceived by grown-ups : '' They
have stuffed me up with stories," he kept on saying, and
he is particularly careful as to what he himself admits.
He was asked if the sun knew that it went forward, he
replied, " If there is a God, the sun knows it, hut if there
isn't, it doesn't."

This reply is very curious and shows well enough that
the consciousness with which things are endowed is part
of the belief in a general system. If God controls things
they are conscious, otherwise they are acting mechanically.

§ 4. The Quarters of the Moon. — It is best to con-
sider separately this problem of the phases of the moon
on which we have already touched in dealing with the
origin of the sun and moon. It will serve moreover as a
control in showing us if the children's explanations corre-
spond by age with the gradations that we have already
established. There is no particular reason why it should,
and we can consider this new problem as partly independ-
ent of the preceding one, that is to say as constituting a
genuine control.

In actual fact, three stages emerge analogous to those
already established, they are integral artificialism, qualified
artificialism, and natural explanation.

During the first stage, the phases of the moon are re-

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 281

garded as being either moons which have been born or
moons which have been cut up by people. These are two
forms of integral artificialism.

The cases of Roy (6 years), of Gaud (6| years), and of
Purr (8 ; 8 years) (see §§ i and 2) may be recalled first.
In these the quarters of the moon were said to be moons
which were beginning, that is which had just been made
and which were growing just like babies. It is not
necessary to return to these cases.

As to the belief according to which the quarters are
moons which have been cut up by people, here are three
examples : —

Fran (9:0): " What is the moon hke ? — Quite
round. — Always ? — No, sometimes it's only a half. — Why
only a half ? — Because sometimes it has been cut. — Do you
really beheve that ? — Yes I do. — Why has it been cut ? —
So that it should look prettier. — Who cut it ? — People. —
Can the moon come round again ? — No, afterwards they go
and look for the other half of the moon and then they make it
whole again."

BuL (7I ): " It was cut up hy people to make half amoon."

Dou (5 ; 0) : " It must have been cut in tivo."

As to the second stage, it shows a mixture of artificialism
and natural explanation : —

Hub (6 J) : "Is the moon always round ? — No. —
What's it like ? — Sometimes a crescent, it is very worn out.
■ — Why ? — Because it has done a lot of lighting.— How
does it come round again ? — Because it is made again. —
How ? — In the sky."

Caud (9:4): " Does the moon see you ? — Yes, some
days it is round and sometimes it's only half or quarter. —
Why ? — God makes it round or half in order to count the days
(notice the way in which the child has disfigured an ex-
planation which obviously was presented quite other-
wise).-— It has been cut ? — No, it makes itself round and
then afterwards in half."

In both cases a union may be seen, which is in no way
contradictory in a child, of a natural process which
involves being worn out or cut up, and of a controlling or a
constructive action which is of a quite human order. In
the third stage, this second fact is eliminated and an
entirely natural explanation is sought for the phenomenon.
This explanation presents itself in two forms, character-

282 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

istic of two successive sub-stages. At first the moon is
regarded as having cut itself in pieces or having been
cut up by the wind by a process of dynamism in which
are united an artificiaiism and an animism which have
become entirely immanent : —

Mart (9 ; 5) : " Why is the moon in quarters ? — There
is only half, the wind has cut it into pieces. — Why ? — /
don't know. — Where is the other half ? — Fallen on the
ground. — Can you see it ? — No, it makes the rain (the moon
being a cloud there is nothing strange in the fact that it
turns into rain). — Is it the same moon which comes round
again or is it another ? — It's the same, it gets big again. —
How ? — The wind makes it get big again."

AcK (8 ; 7) : " Sometimes there is a full moon, sometimes
quarters. — How does that happen ? — // divides itself up all
alone. — And then what happens to the rest of the moon ?
— It is hidden by the clouds. — And when there are no clouds ?
— It is hidden in heaven by God. — Why does it divide itself
up }— Because it wants to make the weather bad, and when
there is a full moon it wants to make good weather."

Re (8 ; o) : " How are the quarters of the moon
made ? — There is nothing but a little bit left of it. — Where
is the rest ? — On the Jura. — How does that happen ? —
It gets broken. — How ? — It gets unstuck. — Does it get un-
stuck by itself, or is there someone who does it ? — By
itself. — How does it grow again afterwards ? — It comes to-
gether again. — How ? — It joins up with the other piece. —
Does it know that it wants to join up with the other
piece ? — Yes. — Why is it not always round ? — Because it
makes itself small. — Why ? — Because it doesn't keep itself
big all the time. — Why ? — Because it is cold after it rains."_

Not (10 ; o) : " Half of it goes to one side, and the
other to the other side. — Why ? — To show what weather it is
going to be. — How does that happen ? — Because it gets
warmer, it means that it will be good weather or bad weather."
The moon thus acts of its own accord and consciously.

These cases are interesting in several respects. It is
clear that they are influenced by adult suggestions, in
particular where the child knows that the quarters of the
moon show what the weather is going to be. But these
adult suggestions have been assimilated in an original
manner, and two curious reactions may be noted. First,

ORIGIN OF THE SUN AND MOON 283

the confusion between the sign and the cause, the moon
both causes the weather and foretells it, causing it because
it foretells it. Secondly, there is the finalistic dynamism
with which the child endows the moon. The moon, the
wind, the sky, and the clouds are each moved by an in-
ternal force tending towards a common end, and when
they act on each other it is by intelligent collaboration
and not in accordance with a mechanical system.

The second type of explanation of the quarters of the
moon found during the third stage is more positive.
The phenomenon is the result either of the pivotal move-
ment of the moon which gives the illusion of its being cut
in pieces or else it is due to the obstruction of a cloud.
The moon thus ceases to take part in the process.

Lug (12 ; 3) : " What is the moon like ? — Round. —
Always ? — JSIo. — What else does it look like ? — It's cut
through the middle, in the evening it's round, and in the day
it's cut in two.— \^h.y ? — Because it's day-time. — Where is
the other half ? — Gone away.- — Where to ? — To another
country where it's night. — How does that happen ? — It has
to go to another country. — How does it happen ? — Half of
it goes away to another country. — How does that happen ?
— It goes away when it's day-time here. — Does it cut itself
up ? — No. — Then what happens ? — It lights up the
countries where it's night whilst it is day here. — Is it always
whole ? — Yes. — Is it never in half ? — Yes, in the day-time
because it has turned round (!) — Why can't you see it
round during the day ? — Because you see it from the side.
(Lug means to say " in profile.") — What does that mean ?
— At night it shines ; and hy day it turns away and lights
another country." " Is the moon round like a ball ? —
No, like a cake." Though he hesitates to admit the hypo-
thesis according to which the moon divides itself up,
Lug puts forward this remarkable explanation, which
seems entirely spontaneous, that the moon is like a cake
changing its shape according to the direction in which it
is turned.

ScHM (8 ; 8) :^ " What is there funny about the moon
sometimes ? — It's round and then it turns into a crescent. —
How does that happen ? — When it gets big it makes it cold.
— Where is the other part ? — You can't see it, it's hidden
by clouds, but it's there all the time. — And when there are

284 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

no clouds ? — There are some really all the time. — How
does the moon get big again ? — The clouds go away. — Do
they know they've got to go away 7— The other part of the
moon lights up and then it shines through the clouds."

Carp (8, 7) : " It's the clouds which hide it. — And what
happens to the other half ? — It's behind the clouds. — Is it
cut ? — No, it's behind the clouds."

It is not possible to say if these last cases (of which we
have found many examples) are spontaneous or not.
They seem to show a degree of spontaneity. As to the
case of Lug, it may be compared with the examples we
have seen in Chapter VII, § 2, in which the moon follows
us without actual movement by turning and sending its
rays after us, etc. (See cases of Sart, Lug and Brul.)

To conclude we can now assume that the explanations of
the phases of the moon confirm the scheme which was put
forward in connection with the explanations of the origin
of the sun and moon. An integral artificialism, derived
from primitive participations, gives place to a qualified
artificialism, and this is finally replaced by natural ex-
planations at first dynamic and finalist (that is immanent
artificiahsm) which ultimately become more and more
mechanical.

CHAPTER IX

METEOROLOGY AND THE ORIGIN
OF WATER

It is obvious that, like the primitive, the child makes no
distinction between astronomy and meteorology. The sun
and moon are of the same order as the clouds, lightning
and the wind. We shall therefore pursue our research by
studying explanations concerning the origin of other
celestial bodies, and adding to these, explanations of the
origin of water.

As was the case with the sun and moon, a large number
of spontaneous questions asked by children has convinced
us that the problems we are about to set are in no way
foreign to the child's natural interests- The following
cases prove as much : —

These questions are taken from the collection made by
Stanley Hall.^ At 5 years old: " Why does it rain? —
Where does it come from ?" At 6 : " What is fog ? — Who
made it ?" At 7 : " Where does snow come from? " — Who
makes thunder and lightning ? — What is thunder ? — What is
it for ? — Who makes thunder, etc?" At 8 : " Who makes
the snow ? At 11, concerning a river : " / want to know
what has made it so big. It hasn't rained much."

From the material collected by Mr Klingebiel (to be
published shortly), we quote the following at the age of
3 years 7 months : " Tell me, Mamma, is it God who turns
the tap in the sky so that the water runs through the holes
in the floor of the sky ? " At 3 ; 8 : " Tell me, Mamma,

did God make the sea at X and that at Z too ? He

must have a big watering-can, then."

In the questions asked by Del (see Language and

^ Pedag. Semtn., 1903 (X).
285 .

286 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Thought, Chapter V) at the age of 6^ : " Why (doesn't
the lake go as far as Berne) ? — Why isn't there a spring in
our garden ? (p. 226) — How do you make one (a spring) ?
— Do you need a spade as well to make a spring ? — But how
is the rain made in the sky ? — Are there pipes or streams for
it to run in ? — Why (does thunder happen of its own accord) ?
— Is it true (that is does it happen of its own accord) ? —
But there are not the things for making fire in the sky. —
Why do you see lightning better at night ? (p. 228) — Who
makes the Rhone go so fast?" (p. 264) etc., etc.

There is also James's deaf-mute, d'Estrella, already
quoted in Chapter VII (par. 10) and in Chapter VIII,
Introduction, who provides many interesting recollec-
tions : —

When d'Estrella looked at the clouds he imagined them
to have been made by God's big pipe (d'Estrella referred
to God as the " great strong man, hidden behind the hills,
who used to throw the sun into the air every morning " ; see
Chapter VIII, Introduction). Why? — Because he had
often noted with childish admiration the eddies of smoke
rising from a pipe or cigar. The fantastic shapes of the
clouds as they floated by in the air would often fill him
with wonder. What powerful lungs God must have !
When it was misty the chOd supposed it must be God's
breath in the cold morning. Why ? — Because he had
often observed his own breath in such weather. When it
rained he was quite sure God must have taken a large
mouthful of water and spat it out from his huge mouth
in the form of a shower. Why ? — Because he had fre-
quently remarked the skill with which the Chinese of
San Francisco thus watered the linen to bleach it.

Such identifications of clouds with smoke and of mist
and rain with the breath or the saliva may appear curious.
We shall however find many instances.

The above questions and recollections already suggest
that we shall find the same explanations given concerning
meteorology and water as were found with the sun and
the moon. The questions asked by the youngest children
and the recollections of the deaf-mute are frankly artifi-
cialist. To ask " who made " or " what is it for " is in
fact to suggest the answer in the questions. On the other

METEOROLOGY 287

hand as the children become older the more their questions
show them to be seeking a physical explanation. We may
therefore expect to find again the same process of evolution
that was found in the explanations concerning the sun
and moon : the change from an integral artificialism to
a more and more positive explanation.

We shall exclude from this chapter a certain number of
questions that will be discussed later in the study of
dynamics as it presents itself to the child (see Causalite
Physique) for they are related rather to the causes of
movement than to the origin of objects. Such are for
example the question of the waves, of the movement of
rivers, the movement of clouds, etc. But it is principally
the great question of the origin of the wind and the air —
a question that is inseparable from the study of movement
— that we prefer to reserve for a special chapter {Causaliti
Physique, Chapters I-II).

§ I. The Sky, — Questions concerning the sky, the
night and clouds form a whole that can only be broken
up artificially. We are forced however to start with the
analysis of one of these terms for fear that too much will
obscure the research. Moreover, in the continuous series
of explanations that lead from integral artificialism to a
natural explanation it is equally impossible without
arbitrariness to distinguish the three stages that were
estabUshed in the case of the sun and moon. However
it seems useful to maintain the plan, for a landmark of
some sort is as indispensable as it is arbitrary. In
psychology, as in zoology and botany, classes and species
are necessary but they depend as much on the free choice
of the classifier as on the data to be classified.

For the youngest children (2-6 years), the sky is situated
somewhere near the height of the roofs or mountains.
" Do they go right to the sky ? " Del asked about some
fireworks {Language and Thought, p. 209) . He also regards
the sky as touching the horizon. ^ Thus at 3 years old.
An saw a cow in the distance in a field and asked " It's

^ Cf. Sully, Etudes sur I'enfance (trad. Monod), p. 14

288 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

over there near the sun, isn't it ? " In these circumstances
it is natural that the sky at first gives the child the
impression of being a ceiling or a sohd arch and likewise
of having been made either by men or by God.

The following are examples of the first stage during
which there is integral artificiahsm : —

Gal (5) : The sky is " of stone." It isn't flat but is
" round." It is God who made it.

Gaud (6 ; 8) : It's God who made it. — What of ? —
Earth. It is blue because God " made it blue."

AcK (8 ; 7) : It is God who made it. " He took some
earth."

Bar (9 ; 5, backward) : "It is made of big stones. Big
slabs of stone. — Why doesn't the sky fall ? — Because if it
fell, it would tumble on the houses and people would be
killed. — What prevents it falhng ? — It is well stuck. —
Why ? — Because the slabs of stone are fastened to some-
thing."

But it also happens that the sky is regarded as a crust
of hard clouds which prepares the way for the explanations
of the second stage.

Fran (9, backward) : The sky "is a kind of cloud. —
How did the sky begin ? . . . — It is they ( = men) who
made the sky. — How ? — They found a lot of clouds and then
the men (les Messieurs) took hold of them to press them hard
together, then they said, ' We'll see if they will stick.' — Is
the sky hard ? — Yes." As for these clouds, they come
from the smoke of the houses. The " material cause "
and the " efficient cause " of the sky are thus both
artificial.

BuL (7 ; 6) supposes that the sky is hard. It is made
" of air " or " of blue." It has been made by men.

The youngest children (3-4) usually say that the sky
is made " of blue " ; the blue then later becomes either
of stone or earth or glass or of air or clouds. But during
the first stage the sky is almost always conceived as solid.

During the second stage the child makes an effort to
find a physical explanation for the origin of the sky. The
" efficient cause " of the form of the sky thus ceases to be
artificiaUst. But the matter of which the sky is made

METEOROLOGY 289

remains dependent on human activity ; the sky is of
clouds and the clouds have been produced by the chimneys
of houses, boats, etc.

Gava (8|) : " What is the sky made of ? — It's a sort
of cloud that comes. — How ?- — The steam from the boats goes
up to the sky and then it makes a great blue streak. — Is the
sky hard or not ? — It's like a kind of earth. — Made of
what ? — It's like earth which has lots of little holes ; and
then there are the clouds, they go through the little holes, then
when it rains, the rain falls through the little holes. — How
did it be^n ? . . . — When there was earth, that perhaps
made houses, and then there was smoke, and that made the
sky. — Is the sky alive ? — Yes, because if it were dead, why
then it would fall down {cp. the definition of life in terms
of activity). — Does the sky know it holds the sun or not ?
— Yes, because it sees the light too. — How does it see it ? —
Well it knows when the sun rises and when it sets. — How ?
— Because since it was born ( = the sky) it has known when
the sun was there and now it can know when the sun rises
and when it sets." The sky is thus a great living cloud,
but a cloud that has been produced by the smoke from
houses and boats.

GiAMB (8|) : " What is the sky made of ? — Of air. —
Why is it that the sky is blue ? — It's when the trees are
sicinging they make the air go up high (we shall frequently
meet this belief concerning the origins of wind ; see
Causaliti' Physique, Chapter II, par, i) — But why is it
blue ? — Sometimes the smoke is blue and it falls on to trees
and that makes the sky blue."

Graxg (7 ; 6) : " What is the sky made of ? — Clouds.
— And when it's blue, is it made of clouds? — Yes."
But the sky is solid : God hves above it. The clouds
joined together without being helped by anyone but
they came from houses. They are alive.

During the third stage the child succeeds in freeing
himself from all artificiahsm. The sky is made up of air
or of clouds. It has come into being of its own accord.
The clouds of which it is made are of natural origin.
During this stage, moreover, the idea of a solid arch is in
course of disappearance.

Rey (8) bridges the transition between the second and
third stage. The sky is still a solid arch : " It's hard."

290 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

But it has been formed of its own accord from materials
of natural origin : " There are a lot of little clouds packed
together. — What are they made of ? — They are thick. —
What is the sky made of ? — It is blue. — And made of
what ? — Of clouds. — And the clouds ? — They are blue."
" Sometimes there are some that are blue." As to the origin
of these clouds Rey argues in a circle : the sky makes
the clouds and the clouds make the sky. " What are
clouds made of ? — Of sky. — And the sky ? — Of clouds. —
. . ." etc.

Tracc (9) : " What is the sky ? — It's clouds. — Clouds
of what colour ? — Blue, black, grey or white. — Can you
touch the sky ? — No, it's too high. — If you could go up
high, could you touch it ? — No. — Why not ? — Because
it's air, it's clouds. — What are the clouds made of ? — Dust.
— Where do they come from ? — From the ground. The
dust goes up. — What holds it together ? — It's the wind
that keeps it together."

Lug (12 ; 3) : " What is the sky ? — It's a cloud. —
What colour ? — White. — Is blue sky a cloud ? — Of course
not ! — What is it ? — It's air. — How did the sky begin ? —
With air. — Where did the air come from ? — From the
ground. — What is there above the sky ? — It's empty."

Stoeck (ii) : " What is the sky made of ? — Of clouds,
and of water and of air. — And what makes the blue ? —
Water. — Why is it blue ? — It's the water that makes it. —
Where does the water come from ? — Mist."

These conceptions undoubtedly show adult influence.
If the children had never asked the question they couldn't
at the ages of 10 or 11 know that the sky is made of air
or that it is not solid. But the entire interest lies jn
knowing how the children assimilated what they heard.
In this respect a marked evolution can be seen as they
grow older : a decrease in artificialism at the expense of
a progressive search for explanations which identify
elements (air, smoke, clouds, water), such explanations
being not unlike those of the pre-Socratics.

The best proof that these results are more or less
independent of environment is that they are found else-
where than at Geneva. Mile Rodrigo has been kind
enough to set the same questions to some hundred Spanish

METEOROLOGY 291

children between the ages of 5 and 11 at Madrid and at
Santander. Apart from several vague answers and others
due to conceptions that had been taught, the explanations
were the same as those found at Geneva. On an average
they are somewhat backward in relation to the answers
obtained in Switzerland, but the order of succession of the
answers is the same. Calculating the average age for each
of the three types of explanation, gives 7 years old for
explanations according to which the sky is made of stones,
earth, bricks, etc., 8| years old for conceptions according
to which it is of cloud, and 10 years old for explanations
which embrace air.

§ 2. The Cause and the Nature of Night. — This
group of conceptions and explanations is much more
independent of the child's education than has been the
case of those considered so far. It is therefore of some
interest to see if the process of evolution arrived at in the
preceding inquiries still holds for the explanation of night.
It will be shown that such is indeed the case. It is possible
in fact to distinguish four stages in the evolution of this
explanation. During the first stage the child gives a
purely artificiahst explanation of night, but without
stating how it is made. During the second and third
stages the explanation is half artificiahst and half physical :
night is a great black cloud, moved by human powers,
and which fills the whole atmosphere (second stage), or
which simply blocks out the day (third stage). Finally,
in the fourth stage, night explains itself by the disappear-
ance of the sun.

In the first stage the child limits itself essentially to
explaining the night by its use, which clearly illustrates
the starting-point of all artificiahsm. If he is pressed to
follow up his finahst explanation with a causal explanation,
he will then call in men or God, but without stating how
such a phenomenon occurs.

MoR (5) : " Why does night come ? — Because it is dark.
— Why is it dark }— Because it is evening. Little children
ought to go to bed. — Where does night come from ? — The

292 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

sky. — How does the sky make the night ? — Through God.
— What makes it dark ? — / don't know."

Leo (7 1) : " Where does night come from ? — The sky.
— How is the night made in the sky ? — Because there's a
watch, and in the morning it points right up and in the
evening it's let down. — Why ? — It's down because night-time
is coming. — And what does that do ? — Because it's night.
— What does the night do when the hand points down ?
— (The night comes) because there's the hand pointing
down. — Have you known that long ? . . . — Because at
home there's a sort of lamp, then a hand ; when it falls
that makes it night." As far as we could understand this
" sort of lamp " was a meter that was turned on at night
when the electricity was used. " How did this watch
begin ? — God made it. — What is God ? — A person. — What
does he do ? — He works. — Why ? — For children." It is
clear that for Leo the movement of the hand of a
meter-clock is both the sign and the cause of the
night. Leo takes no account of the " how " of this
phenomenon.

Gill (7) : It is " a^ night that we go to sleep, then it is all
dark. — Why is it dark ? — To go to bed. — Why does it
become dark ? — It is the sky that becomes dark, that makes
everything dark."

Delesd (7 ; 8) : " What is it that makes it all dark at
night ? — It is because we go to sleep. — If you go to sleep in
the afternoon, is it dark then ? — No, sir. — Then what
will make it dark this evening ? . . ." Despite this
objection Delesd maintained that it is because we sleep
that it becomes night.

These answers are of great interest. Their common
basis lies in declaring that it is night because we sleep.
In certain cases (Gill, for example) the association appears
to be simply teleological : night comes so that we can go
to bed. But in other cases, and probably in the most
primitive, sleep is both the final and the efficient cause of
night. There is precausahty. The child is unconcerned
with the " how " : he simply seeks the purpose which
causes night, and this purpose is evidently the fact that
children sleep. Then, under the influence of the questions,
the child completes this precausal association by an
artiftcialist myth. Such is the case of Leo, but it is evident

METEOROLOGY 293

that the myth is nothing but an addition to the precausal
association " night is produced by sleep."

During the second stage the precausal connection
between night and sleep remains the principal factor in
the child's explanation but the " how " as to the formation
of night has been found. Night is a great black cloud
which comes and fills the atmosphere and is due to the
action of men or of God. But it is clear that the pioblem
is merely deferred. How does man's need or his desire
for sleep succeed in producing the big black cloud. For
this the child has no thought.

Van (6) : " What is night ? — When we sleep. — Why is
it dark at night ? — Because we sleep better, and so that it
shall be dark in the rooms. — Where does the darkness come
from ? — Because the sky becomes grey.- — What makes the
sky become grey ? — The clouds become dark. — How is
that ? — God makes the clouds become dark."

Due (6) : " Why is it dark at night ? — Because it is
time to go to bed. — What makes it get dark ? — The clouds
make it. — Did you know that ? — Fve found it out now. —
How do they do it ? — Because some of them are dark. —
You've already seen the moon and the stars at night. Were
there clouds those times ? — Yes, sir. — Are there always
clouds at night ? — No. — And when there aren't any clouds
does the night come of its own accord ? . . . — Why is it
dark when there aren't any clouds ? — It's the clouds that
make it." A few weeks later : " What makes night ? —
Because clouds come that are all black. — Are there always
clouds when it's night ? — Yes. — And why is it light when
it is light '^—So that we can see."

BouRG (9) : " Where does night come from ? — It's the
air which becomes black. — Why does the air become black
at night ? — . . . — And in the day ? — Then the air is white.
At night is it black air that comes or does the white air
become black ? — The white air goes away. — Where does the
black air come from ? — The clouds."

Mart (8 ; 10) : It's dark at night " because we sleep at
night, you can't see anything. — Why is it dark ? — Because
the sky becomes dark. — What makes it ? — Oh ! I don't
know. — What do you think ? — Because it's bad weather. —
What makes it get dark ? — The bad weather. — Is it always
bad weather at night ? — Not always. — Then when it's

294 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

good weather what makes it get dark ? — Because the clouds
catch one another up ( = join together)."

Fran (9) : " What is night ? — It's when it's all dark. —
Where does the darkness come from ? — From the sky. —
How did night begin ? — Because of the clouds that are all
black. — Where do they come from ? — From the sky.— Do
they come during the day or the night ? — The night. —
Why don't they come during the day ? — Because it's light
in the day. At night it's dark. If they came in the day it
would make it night ! — But why do they only come at
night ? How does it happen ? — Because it's darker at
night. — Do the clouds know they are moving or not ? —
Yes, when the clouds come, they all go together so that you
can't see a single spot of white. — Do they do it on purpose ?
— Yes. — Why ? — Because we ought to go to sleep."

ZwA (9) : " What is night ? Where does it come from ?
— Because it's as if it's going to rain, it becomes dark. —
What is the darkness ? — It's the night. — Where does it
come from ? — It comes from the clouds. — Why does it come
every evening ? — Because people are tired. — What makes
night come ? — The sky. It gets dark. — Why ? — So that
people can go to bed."

Pat (10) : Night is "darkness." "Where does it come
from ? — God. — How does God make it ? — / don't know.
— Where does it come from ? — The clouds. — How ? —
They get dark."

For the children of the second stage night is thus big
black cloud or black air. This cloud does not block out
the day. It is not a screen. It is night itself, either
because it is derived from the " black air " (Bourg) or
because it produces black reflections.

The answers are interesting from the point of view of
artificialism. The cause that moves the cloud is either
the will of man or of God and is completely explained
by the obhgation to make us sleep. On the other hand, the
artificiahsm is combined with an integral animism : the
fact of commanding a cloud implies that it consciously
obeys. As to the origin of this cloud, whether sent by
God or by men, it is the same as that of all clouds in
general : it is the smoke from the houses.

The artificialism of the second stage is thus less complete

METEOROLOGY 295

than that of the first : man is no longer directly the cause
of the formation of night. He is merely the agent of its
movement.

Numerous traces of this practical artificiahsm are still
to be found in the third stage. But great progress has
been made, in the sense that the night is no longer regarded
as a substance, but simply as the absence of daylight.
The child still calls in the clouds to explain night, but the
night no longer actually consists of " clouds," they merely
" block out " the daylight. Night is thus henceforth
held to be a shadow, in the adult sense of the word.

But it is evident that the passage from the conception
of night-substance to that of night-shadow is not immediate
but insensible. There exist numerous intermediate cases
in which the child wavers between the two conceptions
without succeeding in making up its mind. The following
is an example : on the one hand it is said that the clouds
block out the day (third stage), but on the other hand it
is still beheved that the cloud must be black to produce
the night, which comes to the same thing as still assimi-
lating the night to a black substance (second stage).

RouL (7) : " What is night ? — Black clouds. — Where
do they come from ? — The sky. — How ? — They pass in
front of the white clouds. — Why do they come at night ? —
To hide the white clouds. They come to their place (answer
of the second stage). — How does that happen ? — They
come by themselves. They move. — How ? — God makes them
come. — Could you make it night in this room ? — Yes. —
How ? — By shutting the shutters. — What would happen
then ? — You wouldn't see the daylight any more. — Then
why would it be dark in the room ? — Because the shutters
are shut. — Is that night then ? — Yes. — Is there a black
cloud in the room when the shutters are shut ? — No. —
Then what is it, this night in the room ? — You can't see
the day any more.— And the night outside, what is that ?
— The sky is blocked out by the great black clouds that come.
— Must they be black to block out the day ? — Yes. —
Could the day be blocked out by white clouds ? — No,
because they couldn't block it out."

Roul thus gives two explanations side by side. On the

296 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

one hand, night is made up of black clouds which take
the place of " the white clouds " and on the other, night
is a shadow produced by a cloud that acts as a screen.
The next cases clearly belong to the third stage, that is
to say they define the night from the outset and without
suggestion as a shadow produced by the clouds blocking
the daylight.

Mai (8 ; 7) : " What is night ? — // is when it is no
longer light. — Why isn't it any longer light ? — When the
clouds are in front of the light. — Who told you that ? —
No one. — And the light ? — When there arcnt any clouds.
— What makes the light ? — The sky. ..."

Bab (8 ; ii) : " \Vhy is it dark at night ? — Because the
sky is hidden and the clouds." It is the clouds that thus
hide the sky : " The clouds cover the whole sky and you can't
see anything. — Where do the clouds come from ? — The
sky. — What colour are they ? — Grey.— V^onXd white clouds
do just as well to make night ? — Yes. — Why l^Because
they all do."

It is clear that the clouds no longer play the same part
as in the second stage, that is to say the part of producing
darkness solely by their presence, whether they fill the
atmosphere or cause black reflections. The clouds hence-
forward act as a screen, whatever their colour. Thus
to make it night, it needs merely to " cover the sky "
and thus hide the light which comes from the sky.

Finally, during the fourth stage the children realise that
night results solely from the sun's disappearance. They
do not of course know that the earth revolves round the
sun. It is, moreover, completely useless to teach them
this too early since they cannot possibly understand it.
We have seen children of 9 and 10 years old who had been
taught the idea that America is the other side of the
globe ; they had concluded that America is like a lower
story compared with Europe and that to reach America
the sun had to cross the sea by a tunnel which pierced
what formed the floor of Europe and the roof of America.
But without knowing that the earth is round the child

METEOROLOGY 297

can succeed in understanding that day is caused by the
sun and night by its disappearance.

In fact during the preceding stages and even during the
third, the sun is not regarded as indispensable to day.
Day is caused by white clouds or white air or by the sky : —

Thus Deu (7) told us that the night is " a black cloud
that hides the white sky." Although this answer is of the
third stage Deu believes it to be the sky that makes it
light : " The sun isn't like the light. The light makes every
thing light, hut the sun only the place where it is."

During the fourth stage, on the contrary, the child
finally reahses that it is the sun that causes the daylight.
This is usually due to adult influences but we beheve that
certain subjects make this discovery unaided. The
following are examples of the fourth stage : —

Caud (9^) : " Where does night come from ? — It's
when the sun sets that night begins. — Who told you that ?
— I've seen it. — Why is it night when the sun sets ? —
Because it isn't day any more. — Why does the sky become
black at night ? — Because you can't see the daylight at
night. You can't see where the sky is."

Bonn {^) : " Why is it black at night ?—When it's
time to go to bed. — Why is it dark at night, what do you
think ? — Because the sun is hidden. — What makes it day ?
— When there's the sun."

The succession of these four stages thus shows a pro-
gressive decrease in artificiahsm at the expense of an
attempt to find explanations that shall be more and more
adapted to physical reality. The order of succession of
these stages, in particular of the first two, clearly indicates
one of the roots of the child's artificialism : he begins
by being interested in the " why " of things before he has
any concern for the " how." In other words he starts
from the impUcit postulate that everything has some
meaning in the order of things : everything is conceived
according to a plan and this plan itself is regarded as
contributory to the good of human beings. Night is "so
that we can sleep." This is the starting point (first stage).
Only then is the child concerned to know the author of

298 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the phenomenon and how it arises (second stage). The
author is naturally man himself for whose sake the night
exists. The " how " is the smoke of the chimneys which
makes the clouds and the black air that fills the atmos-
phere. By what means has Providence secured the regular
return of night ? — The child does not even ask this. He
is so sure that it is moral necessity and not chance or
mechanical force that ordains the course of things that he
supix)ses without seeking further, that men's wishes,
coupled with the good will of the smoke and the clouds,
themselves suffice to secure the constant succession of
nights. Such, then, is child artificiahsm, so long as rehgious
education has not intervened to comphcate it by con-
ceptions foreign to his spontaneous thought.

§ 3. The Origin of the Clouds. — To the child mind,
the sky and the night are essentially made of clouds.
We must, therefore, next consider whence the clouds come.
This provides a most choice field for the study of arti-
ficiahsm, for here the child may reveal complete spontaneity.

On the subject of the origin of clouds we have statements
collected from Paris, Nice, Savoy, the Valais and Geneva.
Mile Margairaz set the same questions at Carouge, Mile
M. Roud in the Vaudois district, and Mile M. Rodrigo in
Spain. The results obtained in these different environ-
ments have been found to tally, often with a parallehsm
so striking that the conclusions which follow may be
accepted with confidence.

Three stages may be distinguished in the evolution of
explanations concerning the origin of the clouds. During
the first stage (average age 5-6 for Geneva), the cloud
which is usually regarded as solid (of stone, earth, etc.)
is conceived as made entirely by men or by God. During
the second stage (average age 6-9 for Geneva and Paris)
the child explains the clouds by the smoke from the roofs
and maintains that if there were no houses there would be
no clouds. The artificiahsm is thus more indirect than in
the first stage but is still very systematic. Finally, during
the third stage (from 9-10 on the average), the clouds are

METEOROLOGY 299

of entirely natural origin : the cloud is condensed air or
moisture, or steam or heat, etc.

The following are examples of the first stage : —

AuB (7) : " Where do clouds come from ? — From the
mountain. They come down, and then they stay there. —
What do you think they are made of ? — Earth. — Where are
they ? — In the sky. — How do they get up to the sky ? —
It's God who makes them go up, because they couldn't do it
alone." Nevertheless, the clouds are ahve : " If they move,
of course they must know it."

Gril (7) told us concerning rain : " It's God who makes
it come. — How ? — He takes some big balls and he throws
them up and it rains. — What are the balls made of ? —
Stone. — Do we know when God throws these balls ? —
Yes, we hear the thunder." And a few minutes later :
" Where do the clouds come from ? — The sky. — What
are they made of ? — Stone." The clouds are aUve and
know when they move. So too Tac (6 ; 5) beheves the
clouds to be made by God : " What are they made of ? —
They're made of stone. Then that breaks. It's stuck fast
on to the sky."

For Rat (8) the clouds have been made of earth, on
the mountain and by men " because they couldn't make
themselves all alone."

The use of the clouds is variously interpreted : —

For Gril (7) clouds serve, as has just been seen, to make
thunder and thus to bring rain. They come also " to
make it light."

For other children, the clouds are made " to make it
night," " to show it's going to rain," etc.

The answers of this first stage are thus comparable to
the most primitive explanations of the origin of the sun
and moon (see Chapter VIII, §§ i and 2). In both
cases, the integral artificiaUsm implies animism rather
than excludes it. The sun and moon are fires lit by man
yet none the less they are ahve. The clouds are made of
stones or of earth dug up by men and yet they are alive
and conscious.

Further, in both cases children are found who believe
there is an initial participation between the celestial
bodies and man, as if the clouds and the sun and moon
had been directly produced by man.

300 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Roy (6) told us, it will be remembered (Chapter VIII,
§ i), that the sun and moon began " because of us, we
started being alive," and they grew " because we grew." He
then added that it is the clouds that make the sun and
moon grow bigger. This second statement seems to
contradict the first. But we shall see that this is not
really so. In fact, a month after we had questioned him
about the sun and moon we saw Roy again about the
clouds : " Where do the clouds come from ? — The sky. —
How ? — The sky makes them. — How ? — Because it is useful
to make them. — How ? — Because that makes them cut in
two. — What is cut in two ? — The sky. — What is a cloud
made of ? — A ir. — And the sky ? — A ir too. — What happened
the first time there ever was sky ? — It has always been. —
But the first time ? — // was because of the wind. — Where
did the wind come from }~The sky. — How did it happen ?
— // was someone who blew. — Who ? — Men. — What men ?
— The men whose business it was."

These conversations suggest romancing. But, besides
the fact that Roy has always seemed free from all
romancing, exactly the same myths are found in the
recollections of childhood of the deaf-mute, d'Estrella,
recorded by James, and from which we have already
made numerous extracts : —

It will be remembered that to explain the origin of the
sun and moon, d'Estrella (Chapter VIII, Introduction)
supposed a " great strong man " hidden behind the hills
of San Francisco. This man whom in his recollections
d'Estrella calls " God " also explains the clouds :
When it oDas windy he regarded this as an iridication of
God's temper. A cold wind showed his anger ivhilst a fresh
breeze indicated good humour. Why ? Because the child
had sometimes felt the breath issue from the mouths of people
who were angry or quarrelling. When there were clouds
they came from God's great pipe because he had noted with
childish admiration whirls of smoke rising from a pipe or
cigar. The fantastic shapes of the clouds would often fill
him with wonder as they floated by and he would marvel at
the thought of what huge lungs God must have. When it was
misty he supposed it due to God's breath in the cold morning
because he had often noticed his own breath in such weather.

During the second stage the origin of the cloud is half

METEOROLOGY 301

artificial, half natural. It is artificial in, so far as the cloud
is produced by the smoke from the chimneys. It is
natural in that the form and the rising of the clouds are
independent of man. As is to be expected the clouds
continue during this second stage to be regarded as alive
and conscious. The following are examples : —

Hans (5) : " Where do the clouds come from ? — The
sky. — How does that happen ? — It's the smoke. — Where
does it come from, the smoke of the clouds ? — The fire. —
What fire ? — The fire in the stove. — What stove ? — When
you cook. — If there weren't any houses, would there still
be clouds ? — Yes. — Well then where do they come from ?
— No. There wouldn't he any."

Bois (5I) : " Where do the clouds come from ? — From
the sky. — What are they made of ? — Like the sky. — What
of ? — Of clouds. — What are the clouds made of ? — Of blue
or white. — How did the clouds start in the beginning ? —
From the chimney. — How ? — (The chimney) it's for the
smoke to go out. — And then ? — It goes up into the sky, that
makes the clouds."

Moc (8) : " Where do the clouds come from ? — From
the smoke. — Where is that ? — From the chimney. — If there
weren't any houses would there still be clouds ? — No."

Port (9) : " Where do the clouds come from ? — From
the smoke. — What smoke ? — The smoke from the chimneys
and from the stoves and then from the dust. — How does this
smoke make clouds ? — It's painted in the sky. It drinks
the air, then it is painted, then it goes into the sky. — Does
this smoke of the clouds only come from the chimneys ? —
Yes, and when there's someone who makes afire in the woods.
When I was in Savoy, my uncle made a fire in the woods,
that made smoke, it went into the sky, it was quite blue. —
Have you seen it blue ? — Yes, it is blue, but when it goes
into the sky it is black. — Do the clouds feel heat and cold ?
— Yes, because it's the clouds that make the cold come and
then the heat."

Mai (9 ; 6) : " What are the clouds ? — They're smoke.
— Where does the smoke of the clouds come from ? — From
the chimneys, from the gas-works."

BouRG (9 ; 6) explains as we saw in § 2 that night is
due to the black air coming out of the clouds: " Where
does the black air come from ? — The clouds. — Where do
the clouds come from ? What are they made of ? — Of

302 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

smoke. — Where does the smoke come from ? — The
chimneys."

Marg (io) : The clouds are made "from the smoke."
" What smoke }— White or grey. — Where does this smoke
come from ? — The chimneys." On the other hand, the
clouds " are alive. — Why ? — Otherwise they couldn't move.
If they weren't alive they couldn't move." They are also
conscious of what they do.

ZuL (lo) : " What are clouds ? — The smoke that gets
lost in the air, then it turns into the clouds. When it rains
they get quite white, and sometimes red.-^WhSit are they
made of ? — Smoke." They are alive " because they move."

It is interesting from the pedagogical point of view to
note that this moderated artificialism of the second stage
is so persistent that even the best lessons that can be
given on clouds risk being distorted by the pupil and
assimilated to the schema outhned above. In fact we
have met quite a large number of school children who
knew that clouds are " en vapeur " and that this " vapeur "
is produced by heating or boiling water (an illustration
in one of the reading books on steam) but they conclude
from this that all clouds have been produced from sauce-
pans. These children have evidently retained their
spontaneous explanation but have substituted for the idea
of " smoke " that of " steam." The following are examples
of this artificialism in which the matter has been borrowed
from adplt conversation only to be mutilated : —

BuL (ii ; 8) : " How are clouds made ? — They're the
mist from the sea {la vapeur de la mer). — Why ? — They
come from the mist from the sea, from the water that evapo-
rates.— Why does it evaporate ? — The water is hot. — Why
is it hot ? — Because it's been made hot. — By what ? — The
fire. — How did that happen ? — The fire of the boats. — Do
they heat the water in the sea? — Yes." Moreover, the
clouds " are also water that's been heated in the houses, when
the windows are open." This shows how much a child of
nearly 12 has understood of lessons on the evaporation of
the sea !

DucR (8i) : The clouds are " of steam {vapeur). When
water is cooked in the saucepans it makes steam and it goes
up to the sky." On the other hand the clouds are alive

METEOROLOGY 303

" because they fly in the air as if they were birds, but they
go very fast."

The following cases are intermediate between the second
and third stages : the child mingles with his artificiaUsm
what is clearly a natural explanation. Clouds are thus
given a double origin : the smoke or steam of which the
the cloud is made arises both from the houses and from
the lakes or sea.

Cen (8 ; 6) : "Do you know where clouds come from ?
— Steam. — What is steam ? — It's like smoke. — Where does
steam come from ? — From water when it's boiling or nearly
boiling." " Where does the steam of the clouds come from?
— When you cook the soup. — Does cooking the soup make
the clouds ? — The steam goes out and it takes water with
it." Cen would thus seem in the second stage but he adds :
" Without houses would there still be clouds ? — Yes. —
Where would they come from ? — Other countries. — If
there weren't houses in other countries either would there
still be clouds ? — Yes. — How ? — They'd make fires and
there would be smoke and then steam." And if " they " did
not make fires there would still be clouds that came
"from the mountains," but Cen doesn't know how they
would be made. Cen is thus a child who clearly feels that
the clouds are in part independent of man, but he does
not know how to explain this and so has recourse, when
pressed, to artificiaUst explanations.

Caril (ii ; 7) : The clouds are " of steam. — Where does
it come from ? — It's made by the sun . . . {it comes) from
the sea ; it comes when you heat water. — Where do the clouds
come from ? — The saucepans."

These examples obviously show the influence of the
lessons the children have been given. The following case,
on the contrary, seems to be spontaneous : the clouds
have an origin that is at first artificiaUst, but they are
made by a natural process : —

Vel (8^) started by sajdng : " The clouds are made of
air." But their first origin is artificial : " How are they
made ? — Of smoke. — Where does this smoke come from ?
— Stoves. — Are air and smoke the same thing ? — No, the
smoke makes the air and the air makes the clouds."

304 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Next comes the third stage during which the children
attribute to the clouds an entirely natural origin. Un-
fortunately the majority of the answers now obtained
are directly inspired by school lessons (the reverse of what
was found with the sun and moon). " It's the sun that
makes the water evaporate." The sun turns it into steam
by heating it, etc. But, besides these formulae that have
been learned, are found a number of more or less spontaneous
explanations, which alone will be mentioned and which
are of interest. The principle of these explanations is the
same as that of the explanations that were collected on
the natural origin of the sun and moon (Chapter VIII
§ 3) : that is to say identity of substance. Clouds are
of condensed air, of smoke, lightning, heat, moisture, etc. ;
air, fire, smoke, steam and water being felt to have the
power of transforming themselves, from one to the other
just as was maintained in the pre-Socratic physics. The
first examples identify the cloud with the smoke of
lightning : —

Ben (7I) : Clouds are made " of the smoke " that comes
from the thunder. " It's the thunder that brings the water."
Thus the lightning gives off smoke, and the smoke is
changed into cloud which turns into water.

Fav (7) : Clouds are " of fire." Thunder comes from
the cloud and the cloud is the smoke of the thunder,

Lef (8|) : " Where do clouds come from ? — They come
from the thunder, they're water." The water comes from
the thunder because the thunder smokes and the smoke
becomes water.

Gerv. (ii) believes that the clouds are made of the
smoke from volcanoes. Correspondingly the earth is made
of heaped-up clouds (see Chapter XI, § 3).

The next examples reduce the cloud to air or to com-
pressed air : —

Chev (8 ; 2) : " What are clouds ? — Air. — Where do
they come from ? — Behind the mountain. They're made
behind the mountain. — Tell me how ? — By a lot of air. The
air gets together and then it goes up. — How are they formed,
these clouds which are just above us ? — By the air up

METEOROLOGY 305

there. There's more air up there than down here.- —But you
told me they were made behind the mountain. --T/^a/'s so
as one doesn't see them being made. -Wow are they made ?
— By the air. — And were those ones overhead us made
behind the mountain ? — Yes, because they ivent up earlier.
They went up in the night, while those by the mountain went
up in the day. — Are they only made behind the mountains ?
— No, some are made before, in front of us. My brother told
me so. All the air comes and it makes mists. — You say they
are sometimes made in front of us ? — .-1//, that's by the air
down here joining together. — How does that happen ? —
There is a lot of air that comes. It makes a big heap."

LiDT (9) : " What are the clouds made of ? — Air. —
What happens to this air in the sky ? — It turns into a great
cloud, then it becomes very heavy and it falls."

ZwA (9) : " There is some smoke from the water which
goes up to the sky and makes the clouds. --Whcxe does the
smoke from the water come from ? — The water makes it.
— Where ? — Inside. It's made at the bottom of the water
and it comes to the top. — How }— Because the lake always
goes down more. There is a little sand which goes up like
smoke and it goes up to the sky. — What makes the smoke,
the water or the sand ? — The sand. — Why does the smoke
from the water come out of the sand ? — Sometimes there
are little stones which break and smoke comes out. — Why ?—
Because the water is strong and so they break." Zwa evi-
dently means by the term " smoke from the water " the
air bubbles that can be seen forming on the wet sand on
the banks of the Lake of Geneva.

As to the identity of the cloud with heat and moisture
examples will be found when studying the explanations
concerning the formation of rain (§ 5).

The originality of these few answers of the third stage
is clear. The clouds are explained as due to an entirely
natural process, and this process consists essentially in
the transformation of substances qualitatively hetero-
geneous. Further, some children arrive at the interesting
notion of a condensation of substances. Thus Chev and
Lidt speak of the air " which joins together," which
" becomes very heavy," etc. Arc these ideas spontaneous ?
If one only had these examples to go by one might doubt
it and see merely the result of lessons on rain or steam

3o6 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

that had been badly understood. But these explanations
are of the same type as those that children of 9 and 10
give for the origin of the sun and moon (that they are
of air or of condensed cloud), and for the origin of stones
(pebbles are earth that has been pressed together) and
especially differences of specific weight between objects
(a heavy object is " fuller " or " more compressed " than
a light object of the same volume ; see Causalite Physique).
In these conditions there is nothing unlikely in supposing
the explanations quoted above to be spontaneous.

If we now examine the results obtained elsewhere than
at Geneva, we shall find an exactly similar process of
evolution, but with differences in the average age of the
stages. At Paris, out of some fifty children examined in
detail, it was found that the first stage is at an average
age of less than 7, the second gives an average age of 8
and the third of 9^. In Spain these stages are found at an
average of 7^, 9 and io|. In the country, artificialist
explanations naturally disappear earlier but the same types
of explanation are found. We found young country
children claiming that the clouds are produced by the
<:himneys of the houses at Beaulieu-sur-mer as much as in
the heart of the Valais, in the Vaudois or in Savoy.

In conclusion, it is clear to what an extent the child's
natural trend of mind impels it to artificialism even in
regard to things in appearance as independent of man as
the clouds. The details of this artificialism are certainly
not of great interest. In particular, the dominating
idea among children, according to which the clouds are
nourished by the chimney smoke, is the idea which is
most natural to minds already leaning towards artificiahsm.
But the detail is of small consequence. The interest is in
the general tendencies it supposes. If it be remembered
that the sky and also the sun and moon are thought of by
the child as formed of clouds above all else, and that
night itself is due to a regular activity of the clouds
which is intentional or at any rate teleological, the signi-
ficance of the results analysed becomes clear. Nothing

METEOROLOGY 307

is left to hazard in the child's universe. Smoke itself,
which would seem to be the type of useless object depen-
dent solely on caprice, is conceived by the children as
forming the material of the sky and as essentially the cause
of atmospheric fluctuations and of the night. From the
point of view of animism, it follows naturally that during
the first two stages the smoke and the clouds are conceived
as conscious and alive. During the third stage, on the
contrary, animism is in abeyance. But many of the
children who identify the clouds with air, or, in accordance
with the lessons they have been taught, with water vapour,
still regard them as conscious. The question will be
considered again in deahng with the movement of the
clouds {Causaliie Physique).

§ 4. Thunder and Lightning. — Before passing to the
study of children's accounts of the formation of rain, their
conceptions concerning storms must be examined. All
children are interested in the question of storms. Count-
less questions may be collected on thunder and lightning.
Those of the earhest ages, up to about the age of 6, are
manifestly artificialist, even in form. Del at 6| {Language
and Thought, p. 173) asks, for example, on being told that
thunder happens of its own accord : " Why does it happen
by itself? Is it true? — But aren't there all the things to
make fire with in the sky."

The answers obtained may be classified into three stages.
During the first, thunder and hghtning are regarded as
made just as they are in the sky, or on the mountains.
During the second stage they are produced by natural
means by the clouds or the sun which are themselves
regarded as having an artificial origin. During the third
stage, the origin of storms is entirely natural.

The following are examples of the first stage, which is
hardly ever found beyond the age of 6 : —

Stei (5) : " What is thunder ? — Hitting with hammers.
— Do you really think that, or are you just making it up ?
— I think it. — Who hammers ? — God.- — Why ? — To make
it rain. — What is lightning ? How is it made ? — / don't

3o8 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

knoin).— By itself ? — Yes. Before the thunder. — What is
it made of ? — Fire. — Where does hghtning come from ? —
From the fire because it's being lit with matches. It lights
and that makes the lightning. — Who hghts it ? — God. —
Why ? — He lights it so as to make a noise. — Why ? —
Because he wants to. — Why does he want to ? — / can't
remember any more."

Don (5 ; 5) : " What is Hghtning ? — It's made by the
thunder. — How ? — The thunder cracks and then the lightning,
it's the thunder that makes it. — What is the hghtning made
of ? — Fire. — Where does the fire come from ? — The
thunder. — Is the thunder made of fire ? — There's fire in
the thunder. — Where does the thunder come from ? — The
mountai^i. — How is it made in the mountain ? — The
builders do it. — How ? — They take some iron and make the
thunder with it."

All the myths in this first stage are alike. The second
stage lasts on an average from the ages of 7 to 9. Thunder
is due to an explosion of the clouds and lightning to fire
coming out of the clouds or the sun, or moon. But the
clouds and the sun and moon are thought to be formed
from the smoke from the houses or from air made by men.

Roy (6 ; 5) : " What is thunder ? — It's lightning. Then
that makes fire and then it growls. — Where does the fire
come from ? — The sm».— Why does it growl ? — The moon
makes it growl." It will be remembered that for Roy the
sun results from a match thrown by God, and in any case
the sun grows bigger by virtue of the clouds which are
produced by people breathing.

Due (6 ; 10) : " What is thunder ?— //'s when the
lightnings meet. — Where does the lightning come from ? —
The sky. — What is it ? — Like fire. It's from the stars."
The stars, however, have been made by man.

Bois (5 1) starts by forming a reciprocal association
between thunder and the stars ; " What is thunder ? —
Fire. — How is it made ? — With stars and with fire. — How
are the stars made ? — By it (the thunder) making them
catch fire." But both result from the hghtning which is
formed by the clouds : " Where does the hghtning come
from ? — The clouds. — Is there fire in the clouds ? — Yes. —
How is that ? — From the smoke." That is to say the
clouds having been made from the smoke from the roofs
(Bois is definite on this point) they can change back again

METEOROLOGY 309

to fire, which gives birth to the Hghtning and thence to
the thunder and the stars.

The most common explanation found in the second
stage is that the thunder is produced by the colHsion
of two clouds and the lightning by the conflagration thus
set up, the clouds being made of smoke and the smoke
containing fire !

Cess (8 ; 6) : " What is thunder ? — Fire. — Where does
it come from ? — The clouds hitting one another .—^V^hy does
that make a noise ? — Because they hit one another so hard.
— What is lightning ? — Fire. — Where does it come from ?
— From the clouds because they've hit one another. — How
does it happen ? — Because they're made of fire, like the sun
and the moon."

Moc (8) : " Where does thunder come from ?-'The
clouds. — How ? — When they hit they burst. — What is
lightning ? — Fire. — Why does fire come out ? — Because it
(the thunder) makes the clouds burst."

Bo (9 1) : " What is thunder ? — The clouds hitting one
another. — Why ? — To make the thunder .—Vv here does the
noise come from ? — Their hitting one another. — Is a cloud
hard ? — Yes. — Like the table ? — No (Bo had said shortly
before that clouds are the smoke from the stoves). — What
is lightning ? — The thunder coming out." There is fire
" in the clouds. — Is there fire in the clouds now ? — Some-
times.— What are clouds. — Fire."

The third stage marks the appearance of purely natural
explanations. The majority of these have been learnt
and concern the " electricity " of the clouds. But, as
usual, a good number of original answers are found
showing a relative spontaneity. These alone will be
quoted. They consist essentially in treating the storm
as the clash of two clouds, but of clouds made of air or
steam, etc. As to the lightning, it arises either from the
explosion or from the friction thus produced, or again
from sparks due to the stars.

Ch.\i (9) identifies, as has been shown (Chapter VIII,
§ 3), the sun with a cloud and both too with the air. We
saw Chal again a month after these answers were obtained
and he recounted the following : " What is thunder ? —

310 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Noise. It's two clouds meeting. — Why does that make a
noise ? — Whe7i they meet they hit.- — Are the clouds hard ?
— No. — How does it make a noise then ? — . . .—What is
Hghtning? — Fire. — Where does it come from? — It comes
from the clouds ; that makes the fire. — Why is there fire
in the clouds l^Because the sun is made of fire. It's a
hall (of fire).^ — Does the lightning come from the sun ? —
No.— Does the fire of the hghtning come from the sun ? —
Yes. — Does the sun make the lightning come ? — No, the
clouds. — Why does the fire of the lightning come from the
sun ? — Because the sun was a ball of fire and it hurst."
The sun, or rather the suns are thus lighted clouds which
in bursting set light to other clouds. The clouds them-
selves are of air and their explosion causes the thunder.

It has been shown elsewhere (Chapter VIII, § 3)
how Ant, And and Gerv explain the formation of the sun
and moon as due to heaped-up lightning. Chal provides
the corresponding explanation in interpreting the Hghtning
as produced by the sun.

Hend (9 ; 8) : " What is thunder ? — It's two clouds
meeting and that makes the lightning. First they touch and
they hit one another and that makes the thunder and lightning.
— Why does it make the hghtning ? — Because the two
clouds ruh against one another and that makes sparks. —
Why ? — If you ruh two hits of stick against one another that
makes sparks too. — Why do they rub one another ? —
They get hot and afterwards the spark comes." Hend
declares that the cloud is not hard and that it is of steam.
But in order for the cloud to be able to move, " the steam
must be pressed together a lot."

Ross (10 ; 7) : " What is thunder ? — The clouds jump-
ing.— How ? — Because they're meeting. — And then what
happens ? — The lightning. — What is that ? — A flash
that is made hy the clouds. — Why do they make a flash ? —
Because they meet."

These explanations are not unhke those of the pre-
Socratics : the air enclosed in the clouds makes them
burst and this rending produces a flash, etc.

In conclusion, this rapid survey of the explanations
concerning the formation of storms confirms what was
seen with regard to the clouds : the evolution of the

METEOROLOGY 311

explanations proceeds from an integral artificialism to an
attempt at a natural constitution, the principle of which
is the identity of heterogeneous substances. The explan-
ation of rain will complete the whole.

§ 5. The Formation of Rain. — The problem of the
conceptions concerning rain is one of the most interesting
connected with the child's artificialism. For since during
the first stages the clouds are regarded as made of stones
or smoke there is no reason for supposing the rain to come
from the clouds, rather than from the sky itself. But
experience has shown the connection between clouds and
rain : when it rains there are always clouds. The child
knows this perfectly well. What sort of connection then
does he imagine to exist between them ? Is the cloud the
sign of rain or the cause of it, dr is there a confusion between
sign and cause as is found among primitives ? As a matter
of fact all three solutions are found more or less mixed
and without any definite relation to age.

For greater clarity, we shall take first the explanations
collected on the origin of rain without considering the
relation of the rain to the clouds which will be dealt with
later as a separate problem.

From the outset numerous spontaneous questions reveal
the child's natural trend of mind from the ages of 2 to 7.
Del at the age of 6| {Language and Thought, p. 203) still
asks : " But how is the rain made in the sky. Are there
pipes or streams it runs along ? " (For Del the " streams "
themselves have been made by man.)

D'Estrella recounts the recollections of childhood quoted
in § 7 : " When it rained, he {d'Estrella himself) never
doubted hut that God (' the great strong man ') had taken
a big mouthful of water and spat it from his huge mouth in
the form of a shower. Why ? — Because he had on several
occasions observed the skill with which the Chinese thus
watered their linen that was hanging up to bleach."

We can classify the answers given into three stages,
according to whether rain is explained by an integral
artificialism, a mitigated artificiahsm or a natural process.

312 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

The following are examples of the first stage, beginning
with a case which recalls the recollections of the deaf-
mute, d'Estrella.

We saw (§ 3) how Roy (6 ; 5) conceives the clouds as
made by the air from human breath : " It's from someone
breathing." Similarly ioi Roy the rain comes from the
clouds : "it comes from the sky. — And the water in the
sky ? — From the clouds.- — Where did the water come from
the first time ? — When there were men who spat a lot."
This answer was not given soon after the explanation
of the formation of the clouds. There is therefore no
perseveration.

Usually, however, the water of the rain is regarded as
actually made by man, but it may often be questioned how
far, allowing for the reticences and the sniggers which
go with the youngest children's answers, the " taps " or
pipes of which they speak have not in certain cases (we
suppose nothing more) a fairly clear symbolic meaning.
We shall postpone answering this question until § 7
where it arises again in connection with the origin of
streams.

Griar (5^) : " What is rain ? — It's water. — Wliere does
it come from ? — The sky. — Is there water in the sky ? —
God sends it down. — How ? — He throws out buckets of water.
— Who told you that ? — No one. — Where does God get
the water from ? — In his tap. — Where does the water
come from for the tap ? . . . (he laughs)."

God is naturally regarded as like a man. Don (5 J)
said that the rain comes from the sky and that God sends
it, he added further : " Are there fountains in the sky ? —
Sometimes there are streams. There is God. — What does
he do ? — He is in his house working. — Why ? — For his
master. — Who is God ? — He's a man {un Monsieur)."

Pan (5) : " And where does the rain come from ? —
The sky. — How ?— / don't know. Perhaps there is a hose
like Daddy has to wet the De Dion [i.e. to wash down the
car). — Do you think it possible ? — Yes, it's possible,
because it's the same dirt. — Where ? — On the pavements, it
makes puddles of water. — How does it come ? — There's a
tap and afterwards there's a pipe that turns and then he
sends the rain to water the flowers. — Who ? — God."

METEOROLOGY 313

Hans (5|) : " It's God who makes it. — How is it made ?
— He takes some water and then he throws it. — Where does
he take the water from ? — From the sink."

Gril (7) says that the rain and the water come from
the sky : " How does this water come ? — Down. — Down
where ? — In the fountains. — How does it get to the sky ?
— By pipes. — Where are these pipes ? — In the street. —
Where do they go from ? — From the fountains or the canal.
— Where do they go to ? — Up to the sky," etc. It is men
who make it rain.

Ram (9) thinks also that it is men and not God who
make it rain. The rain goes up to the sky " by taps. —
How ? — The water flows in the taps. — And then ? — It
makes little drops and then it goes up to the sky. — How does
it go up ? — In spouts of water. — Why don't we see them ?
— Because they're so thin."

It is unnecessary to multiply the instances of such
myths, the gist of which are moreover well known. It
is, as always, open to question exactly how far the children
believe what they are sa3dng and at what point they start
romancing. But the important thing is to realise that
they have nothing with which to replace this artificialism.
Whether they make up the details or not they can only
explain things by having recourse to human activity and
not to the things themselves.

This is why, during the second stage, the child comes
to endow things with human activity. In fact, during
the second stage direct artificialsim is no longer found in
that .the rain no longer comes from taps in the sky. But
there is indirect artificialism, in that it is an object derived
from human activity, like the smoke from the houses, etc.
that produces the rain. But then, and this is what marks
the continuity of the first and second stages, this thing
that produces the rain becomes itself endowed with an
immanent artificialism : there is collaboration between us
and the things. This collaboration is expressed by the
childish phrase: " faire faire " ( = get made). Man and
God get the rain made (" font faire la pluie "), that is to
say they " make " (font) something, but the smoke, the
sky or the clouds also " make " (font) something. The

314 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

two meanings of the word " faire " are thus completely
confused.

The following are examples of the second stage : —

Blas (8 ; io) : " Where does rain come from ? — It
comes from the clouds. — How ? — The smoke goes up and
then thai makes the clouds. — What smoke ? — The smoke
from the houses. — How does this smoke make rain ? —
Because the heat makes the clouds melt. It (the smoke) turns
hack again and then it becomes water. Because the smoke
melts, it changes shape and then water comes." Moreover,
the clouds do this intentionally and consciously : they
know they're going forward " because it moves. So do we
know when we're moving."

Port (9) : The clouds are from the smoke of the houses
again, " then it becomes black and then it turns into water."
" It melts just for a minute and then afterwards it becomes
water." And the clouds move to our commands : " When
people walk in the street too, that makes the clouds move."

Marg (10) : " Where does the rain come, from ? — The
sky. — How ? — It's the clouds and the smoke. — Where does
the smoke come from ? — The chimneys. — How does this
smoke cause the rain ? — Because it melts. — Does the smoke
melt ? — Yes. — What makes it melt ? — The heat." The
clouds again are alive and conscious.

Moc (8) : " Where does the rain come from ? — The
sky. — WTiat is it ? — Water. — How is it made ? — The clouds.
— How ? — Because they jump. The clouds jump and then
the rain comes. — What do you mean by saying they jump ?
— / mean that they burst. — Where do the clouds come
from ? — The smoke. — Where ? — From the chimneys."

For these children therefore the clouds move about
intentionally to wherever rain is necessary and transform
themselves into water. The process of the formation of
rain is thus in one sense natural but the clouds are still
regarded as produced by the smoke from the houses and
above all they obey us either directly (Port) or indirectly.
What happens then when these children are taught that
the rain results from the evaporation of the sea ? Their
spontaneous idea, which is also artificialist, simply becomes
fused with the teaching they have received and they then
conclude that the smoke from the houses " goes and

METEOROLOGY 315

fetches " water from the sea. The following are examples
of this confusion of the child's own idea with the lesson
he has been taught : —

Dem (8) : "At night, sometimes, not always, the clouds
go down and draw up the water." But clouds are made of
smoke. " Are they made of steam ? — Of smoke, not steam !
(laughing). — How do they draw up the water ? — As if
they liked it.- — What would happen if a boat was there? —
It would he such a shock that it would sink."

Bong (9 ; 6) also says that the clouds come from the
chimneys and that the clouds make it rain : " You told
me that the clouds were of smoke. Is there water in
the smoke ? — . . . — Where does the rain come from ? —
Fire. — If a fire were lit in this room would that make it
rain on us ? — No. Because the clouds go down to the sea
and take the water. — How ? — They go on the water and the
water goes into the clouds. — Do they know they are going
to get water ? — Yes."

Cen (8 ; 6) : The clouds are " of steam," that is to say
they are " of air that contains water." " Where does the
steam of the clouds come from ? — When the soup is being
cooked. — Does that make the clouds ? — The steam goes
outside and it takes water with it. — Is there air in the clouds ?
— There is air and there's water on top."

This shows how even the best lessons can be distorted
by an artificiahst mind ! It is clear too what admirable
organisation the child sees in nature, since the smoke from
the houses itself undertakes to fetch water from the sea,
or the air from the saucepans " takes water with it."

This second stage extends on an average from the age
of 7 or 8 to 9I or 10. It forms therefore a perfect transition
between the first and the third stages in that it maintains
a part of the artificialism of the first stage whilst already
foreshadowing the natural processes on which the child of
the third stage lays stress. In fact, during the third stage
besides numerous explanations that have been learned
(such as that rain is condensed water vapour) are a great
number of original answers which alone will be quoted.
Different types are found corresponding to the types of
reply given concerning the origin of clouds (3rd stage).

3i6 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

When the cloud is conceived as of the smoke of lightning
(Ben, Fan, Lef, etc.) water results simply from the cloud
" melting." This is similar to the explanation of the
second stage, except that the smoke has here an entirely
natural origin. It is therefore unnecessary to deal with
it further. When the cloud is conceived as of air, water
results from the transformation of the air into water :

Tron (8|) : " What are clouds made of ? — Rain. —
Where does this rain come from ? — It's air which is turned
into water." A moment later: "And what are clouds
made of ? — Air."

Ant (8) : " Where does the rain come from ? — The
clouds. — How ? — Because the clouds have water. — Why ? —
It's the air (le vent) which changes into water." Ant
believes that the air is itself derived from the clouds which
are made of compressed air.

Chev (8 ; 2) as has already been seen (§ 3) regards the
clouds as air " which joins together." " What makes it
rain ? — Because the clouds are wet. They are full of water.
— Where does it come from ? — Because of the mist. When
there is a lot it makes water. It feels like little drops of water
when we have it here." The mist itself is of air : "All the
air comes and that makes mist." Thus again it is the air
which finally changes into water.

Finally, other children seem spontaneously to regard the
clouds as " heat " or " wetness " or " perspiration," and
the rain explains itself.

ScHi (7 ; 4) said that the clouds come from mist :
" What is the mist made of ? — Water. — Like the water
in the tap ? — No, it's water like when you perspire. It's
not quite water when you perspire, it's like water. — Where
does this water come from ? — / think it comes from being
hot. So that it ought to be heat that makes the clouds come
. . . — How is that ? What heat does it come from ? —
It comes from the sun. — Where does the water come from
that is heated by the sun ? — From the sun itself. — What
is the sun made of ? — Fire, I think. When it's too hot, it's
like when your hands are too hot, the sun perspires, and that
makes the clouds cover it."

Bar (9:5): Water comes "from the c/owis.— What are
the clouds? — They're like water. — Are they water? — No.
heat. — How does heat turn into water ? — It makes it

METEOROLOGY 317

perspire.^— Wh3.t ? — The clouds. Us too sometimes. It's
the sun that makes the clouds perspire to make rain. — How
are the clouds made ? — By little drops that come together
and that makes the clouds. — Where do the drops come
from ? — The sky. — Where does the water come from, the
sky ? — It's like over rocks, the water flows over them and
comes down."

BoucH (11 ; 10) : Rain is " wetness." "Where did the
wetness come from the first time it rained ? — From per-
spiration.— Of what ? — The sun, when it's too much, it
makes it perspire." It is thus the sun itself that perspires.

The process of evolution of these explanations plainly
recalls the explanations of storms or of the formation
of the clouds — air and smoke change into water as well as
into fire. The sun itself perspires (Schi), etc.

It remains to examine the question of the relationship
the child supposes between rain and the clouds. As the
study of the various stages has shown, he begins by thinking
the clouds and the rain to be independent and ends by
maintaining between them a relation of cause and effect,
rain resulting from the cloud. But between these two
extremes hes a critical zone which must now be studied
because the child wavers in a most interesting way between
the idea that the clouds are the " sign " and the idea that
they are the " cause " of rain.

Gril (7) : " Can we see when it's going to rain ? —
Sometimes it thunders." But as was shown in § 3 this
sign is also cause since Gril conceives the thunder as a
stone that God hurls to set free the rain : "He takes great
balls and he throws them and it rains." But this cause is
irrational, since the rain is not contained in the balls but
is set free by them.

Rey (7) thinks that God sends the rain by means of a
tube and that the clouds are of " black chalk." There is
thus no connection between them. Nevertheless, the clouds
are a sign of rain : " Can you see when it's going to rain ?
— No, you can only see the clouds." " Why are there clouds
when it is going to rain ? — Because God is cross." But the
clouds are again partly the cause of the rain : " What are
the clouds ? — They're rain that's going to come." This last
expression does not mean in the least that Rey identifies

3i8 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the cloud with water. He maintains right to the end that
it is " of black chalk." The expression contains simply
the idea that the arrival of the cloud sets free the rain.

Ram (9) regards the rain as going up to the sky by means
of taps. The clouds, on the other hand, are of smoke from
the roofs. There is thus no connection between the two
phenomena. Ram, however, states that the rain can only
go up to the sky if there are clouds : " When does it go
up ? — When there are clouds in the sky. — Then do the clouds
make it come ? — Yes. — How ? — Because they are black."
But Ram insists that the clouds are of smoke and contain
no water. Again the sign is felt to be a cause although the
child is unable to explain how the relation works.

ZwA (9 ; 7) as was quoted in § 3 explains the formation
of the clouds as bubbles of air that come out of the water.
On the other hand, he explains the rain as coming directly
from the sky. Thus he sees no direct connection between
the rain and. the clouds : " What are the clouds for ? —
To show it is going to rain. — Do they make the rain or does
it come from the sky ? — It comes from the sky. — Do the
clouds make the rain ? — No. — Why are the clouds to show
it is going to rain ? — Because if there weren't any, it wouldn't
rain." These last words affirm a causal relationship and
yet right to the end of the examination Zwa continues to
maintain that the rain does not come from the clouds.

Finally, the following case is the plainest example we
found showing differentiation between " sign " and
" cause." But, as we shall see, the child still conceives
the cloud as partially " cause " at the same time that it
is " sign."

BoucH (11 ; 10) conceives rain as the " perspiration "
of the sun. The clouds have a natural origin which Bouch
refuses to specify. " What are the clouds ? What are
they made of ?—They show it's going to rain, that it won't
be fine weather. — Why ? — When you see the clouds in the
distance you know it's going to be bad weather." " If there
weren't any clouds, could it rain just the same ? — Yes
. . . (no), you know it's going to be bad weather when there
are clouds, and it is bad weather at once. — Why ? — After-
wards, when there are clouds, the rain comes at once. — Do
the clouds make it rain ? — They make the bad weather
come and that makes it rain.— Then is it the clouds that
make it rain ? — No, that isn't what makes it rain." " Why

METEOROLOGY 319

does it rain when the clouds come ? — When the clouds come
it makes it night, it makes it dark. — Then why does the
rain come ? — No, there are times when it isn't because the
clouds come that the rain falls. — Why do the clouds show
it is going to rain ? — Because abojays when the clouds come
it rains. — Why ? — The clouds show it is going to he had
weather. — Why ? . . ." These contradictions of Bouch
show plainly how he hesitates between the idea that the
clouds are a sign and the idea that they are the cause of
rain. And even then Bouch does not beheve the rain to
come from the clouds !

These cases are very instructive. Between the stage
during which the child sees no connection between the
rain and the clouds and the stage in which the rain comes
from the clouds, there is thus present in many children
a period of transition during which the clouds foretell the
rain. But as soon as the cloud is conceived as a sign it is
also conceived as a cause. WTiat sort of a causality is
this ? Not a rational causality, since the clouds neither
contain the rain nor set it free by any mechanical process.
The cloud is rather a cause in the sense that it is a necessary
aspect of the event. As L Meyerson stated concerning
certain explanations given by savages : " The cause becomes
one aspect, one side of the event." ^ This formula certainly
fits the relationship estabUshed by our children between
the clouds and the rain.

This idea of the sign being regarded as a necessary
part of the event is, moreover, of great importance to
our research for it constitutes one of the forms of possible
transition between artificialist causahty (and especially
the " participations " which lie at the root of artificialism)
and causahty by identification of substances. In fact, at
the point of departure of the explanations concerning
the clouds and the rain we find various feelings of partici-
pation— the clouds move when we move, they obey us,
they come to make it night and to make us go to sleep,
etc. ; the rain comes to water the plants, to clean the
houses {cp. Pau), etc. At the other extreme of the series

^ Annde psychologique, Vol. XXIII, p. 220.

320 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

of these same explanations we find a rational causality —
the air condenses into clouds and the clouds melt into
water, etc. How is the passage between these two types
of explanation to be bridged ? First, the feehngs of
participation between the clouds, the rain and ourselves,
give rise to various groupings which further strengthen
the artificialist myths when the child invents them — the
cloud thus serves to warn us that God is going to make
it rain, etc. There is thus built up a schema, in which
the rain, the cloud and we ourselves form an indissociable
whole, and it is this schema which gives rise to the arti-
ficiaUst myths that the children make up in answer to
our questions. Then when the artificialist conviction is
in course of disappearing and the human element is thus
dissociated from things, there remains the feeling of a
relationship between the things themselves — the rain and
the clouds are necessary to one another, etc. It is from
this new — so to speak semi-rational — participation that
arise the identifications of substance we found in the
second and third stages. It is thus once more a case of
a dynamic participation giving rise to an identification of
substance,

§ 6. The Explanations of Snow, Ice and Cold. —
The origin of snow and ice may be treated very briefly,
but their explanations must be noted since they have a
certain interest on account of the connection the child
establishes between freezing and cold.

The explanations of the origin of snow and ice may be
classified into three stages. During the first (up to about
the age of 7) there is artificialism.

Bois (5I) : " How is snow made ? — It is made hy men
(des messieurs). — How? — They make it right up high. —
What does that mean ? — They built it. — What makes it
faU ? — They make little holes. — Where ? — In the sky." Ice
is " snow that has frozen," that is to say that has become
" hard."

Stei (5I) : Snow comes "from the sky. — How ? — From
little blue corks. — What makes it like that ? — God.— Why
is the snow cold ? — Because it has ice. — Where does the ice

METEOROLOGY 321

come from ? — It comes from the snow which stayed when it
was very cold."

From about the age of 7 the explanation is natural.
But two types of answer are found, each no doubt character-
istic of a stage. During the second stage (about 7 to 9)
the origin of snow is independent of water.

Gut (8 ; 9) beheves, for example, that rain comes
from steam. But snow comes from " the flakes. — Where
do they come from ? — The sky. — Whereabouts in the
sky ? — From the air." For Bui (11) snow is also of air, etc.

Tau (6) : Snow comes " from the sky, and it's the sky
that's turned into flakes." For Tau, snow turns into
water and ice by being pressed together, but water doesn't
change into ice or snow.

For Rat (8) it is a mixture of water and sand.

Finally, during the third stage after 9 on the average
snow and ice are of frozen water.

Gen (7) : " And where does snow come from ? — From
water. It's dirty water. — How did the water turn into
snow ? — From the cold."

Ch.al (9): "What is snow? — It's rain. — How? —
It freezes high up as it comes down. — What is ice ? — It's
water that has frozen."

It should be noted that even in the third stage ice is
not always regarded as frozen water, but often as com-
pressed snow ; whether the snow itself is thought of as
frozen water or as a substance independent of water
makes no difference. This fact is interesting since it shows
in the first place that identification of substances pro-
ceeds no quicker where the activity seems to come from
experience (as with ice and water) than where it comes
from imagination (as when the air changes into clouds,
rain, the sun, fire, etc.), secondly, it shows a new attempt
at explanation by condensation similar to those we have
already noted, which consists in combining the clouds
and the sun into condensed air, etc. It is true that in the
case of ice each child knew by experience that a ball of
snow when tightly compressed becomes hard and trans-

X

322 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

parent. It is none the less interesting that he explains
all ice as due to a process of condensation of snow.

Gut (8 ; 9), who, as we have just seen, associated snow
with air, replied as follows : " What is ice ? — // is the snow
when it breaks up into pieces. — Why ? — Then it gets hard.
— Why ? — Because it comes from the ice. — How does that
happen ? — It is the snow and it goes into pieces."

BuL (11 ; 8) said that ice, like snow, is " made of air."
Ice " is made of snow." " What do you have to do to get
ice ? — You must wait till it snows. — Have you ever seen a
frozen fountain ? — Yes. — Can water freeze, then ? — Water
and snow. — Can you make ice with water alone ? — No. —
Why not ? — Because there is no snow with it." Ice is
" squeezed " snow.

Hend (9 ; 8) begins by saying that ice is frozen snow :
" Must there always be snow before there is ice ? — Yes,
because it gets hard and then it gets icy. — If I put a glass of
water outside will there be ice or not ? (this was in winter)
— Not at once ! There will be water at the bottom and a layer
of ice on top. — WiU there be snow in the glass before the
ice ? . . . — It is the snow which makes the ice."

It is clear, that the identification of water, snow and
ice wiih each other is only progressive.

BuL (11 ; 8) said that " when ice melts it is only water,"
but he still refused to admit that snow and ice might be
water : " Is it water ? — There is some water as well — And
what else ? — // is not only water."

How, then, are these substances identified with each
other. Can we say here, as in the case of clouds and rain,
that there is an active participation preceding the identi-
fication of the substances with each other before the child
understands the action of cold in freezing water. It will
be seen that this is the conclusion formed from a- study of
the relations of cold and freezing. Anticipating this
conclusion let us reconsider those cases examined hitherto.

The child comes very early to wonder if it is the cold
which makes water freeze or if it is the snow and ice which
bring the cold. But it happens that their explanations
pass through two phases. During the first there is
dynamic participation and at the same time participation

METEOROLOGY 323

of substance between snow and cold — one attracts the
other or one produces the other. Cold, on the other hand,
is a substance assimilated to the air. During the second
phase, it is the cold which produces freezing and the cold is
no longer considered as a substance but as the effect of the
absence of heat and the result of the sun being hidden.

The first phase is strongly charged with confusions
between the sign and the cause and with artificialist
participations which show clearly how the identification
of substance grows out of dynamic participation.

Roc (6) : " Why is it cold in winter ? — Because there is
snow. — What is it that makes the cold ? — The snow. —
If there were no snow would it be cold ? — No. — Is it the
snow which makes the cold or the cold which makes the
snow ? — The cold makes the snow. — And where does the
cold come from ? — From the snow."

Lu (5^) : " Why is it cold in winter ? — Because the snow
falls. — It there were no snow would it be cold ? — No. —
Why does snow fall in winter ? — Because it's cold. — Why
is it cold in winter ? — Because God makes it cold. — What
with ? — With his hand. — How ? — He pushes the cold along.
— Where does the cold come from ? — From the street. —
What is it ? — It's the wind."

Gen (7) : " Where does the cold come from in winter ?
— From the snow. — And where does the snow come from ?
— From the water, it's dirty water.^How does the water
become snow ? — Through the cold. — What is it which makes
the cold ? — The wind."

Pat (9) : " What is the cold ? — The cold is when the
snow wants to fall. — Where does the cold come from ? —
From the wind. — Why is it cold in winter and not in
summer ? — Because the snow is cold."

Hend (9 ; 8) : " Where does the cold come from ? —
From the wind. — Why is it cold in winter ? — Because there
is wind. — And what about those days when there is no
wind ? — Then it's because of the clouds whick break up, that
makes snow and that makes it cold."

For these children, cold produces snow and snow
produces cold. But what is the nature of this production ?
Is it primarily a simple process, half moral, half physical,
of setting each other free. The snow attracts the cold

324 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

and the cold attracts the snow, they lend each other a
mutual aid. Thus for Pat, " The cold is when the snow
wants to fall." Inversely for Pur the snow is to " show
that it's winter."

Pur (8 ; 8) : " Why does it snow in winter ? — It's to
show that it's winter. — Why doesn't it snow in summer ? —
Because of the fruit in summer. If snow fell it would spoil
the fruit. — Why doesn't it snow any more when winter
ends ? — To show that the winter is over."

This is not a sohtary case, most of the younger children
reply in the same way when asked to explain why snow
comes — they even put the question to themselves. This
fact throws Ught on the foregoing replies. The snow is a
sign of cold, cold is a sign of snow, and each produces the
other. This is at any rate the case whilst the child con-
siders snow as having been made by God or by man.
" Substantialism " follows, consequently, upon this
dynamism. Cold is identified as a substance, as air, and
this substance is considered on the one hand to emanate
from the snow, and on the other hand to enter into the
snow as one of its elements. This second attitude is the
distinctive mark of the second of the stages which were
referred to above.

In fact the identification of cold as air is quite general
amongst the younger children. We shall see many cases
of it when studying the notions of children on the atmo-
sphere (see Causaliti Physique). When the child is asked
what the air is, it often repUes that "it is the cold " as if
the cold was a material substance, and if it is asked where
the wind comes from, the reply very often is "it comes
from the cold." On the other hand, there are a large
number of cases where snow and ice are said to be com-
posed of air (see above the cases of Gut and Bui). Bui
reckons that the cold comes from the snow and from the
cold at the same time, thus: " It is the snow which brings
the cold and the wind as well. — Where does the cold come
from ? — From the cold. — What is it ? — It's air."

METEOROLOGY 325

In short, the reply in this first phase shows clearly
enough how the participation, at first dynamic, between
snow and cold gradually gives rise to an identification of
substances, the snow and the cold being finally conceived
as two bodies which are each the product of the other.

During the second phase, on the other hand, the child
discovers that the ice is due to the cold and not the inverse.
As to the cold in winter it is still interpreted as being due
to the wind and then by degrees the child learns to attribute
it to the absence of the sun, etc.

, Cein (10) : " Where does the ice come from ? — It's the
wind which freezes water. — Why is it cold in winter ? —
Because the wind blows."

Baud (13) : " Where does the cold come from in
winter ? — Because of the wind. — Isn't there a wind as
well in summer ? — It's because the air is cold. — Why is
the air cold in winter ? — Because there's no sun."

ScHAW (10 : 8) : " Why does the rain fall Uke snow ?
— Because it is cold. — Where does the cold come from ?
— Because there's no sun. — Isn't there any sun in winter ?
— No. — Where is it ? — Behind the clouds."

To conclude, this study of snow, ice and cold confirms
what we have already established in the case of clouds
and rain, that is, that the explanation by identifying
substances is not primary in the child but is derived.
During the early years the child becomes aware of the
existence of many material objects which it considers
have been formed of three separate substances, namely,
snow (and ice), water, cold (and air). Each of these three
substances seems to it to have been made independently.
The rain is sent by God, the snow is made of blue corks
{bouchons), the cold is air sent by God or by man, etc.
But, thereafter, the child discovers that between these
substances there are dynamic participations, snow signifies
winter, winter signifies cold, and the snow and the cold are
mutually productive, etc. From then onwards, as soon
as the child gives up artificialism he supposes that beyond
these dynamic participations there are participations of
substance, and he seeks to explain the substances one by

326 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the other, the snow is derived from the cold and from the
air, the cold is derived from the snow, etc. At length the
development of his powers of observation shows him what
is the actual order. It is the cold which causes freezing
and not snow which produces cold. Thus, the three
moments of the explanations by identification seem to
be artificialism and dynamic participations, then identi-
fication of substances, and finally the orderly arrangement
of causal relationship.

§ 7. Rivers, Lakes and Sea, the Primitive Origins
OF Water. — If children reaUy have a tendency to arti-
ficialism, this tendency should receive free rein in the
explanation of rivers and lakes, and the study of questions
asked by children would seem to show it. Many of the
questions that have been quoted at the beginning of this
chapter imply artificialism without any doubt. To ask,
for example, why the lake of Geneva does not go as far
as Berne is to suppose that there is a moral reason for
that and that in consequence the lake has been planned
and built .

Children, when asked questions, give replies which may
be classed in three stages. In the first of these stages
everything has been artificially made — the bed of rivers
and lakes and even water itself. During the second stage
the bed has been dug out by man, but the water itself
has a natural origin. During the third stage all of it is
natural.

Here are some examples of the first stage. Amongst
them can be distinguished certain cases, probably of the
most primitive children, who define the origins of water
and suppose them to be physiological, others who con-
ceive water as being artificially made without any con-
scious or avowed physiological idea, and others finally,
who make no sort of definition. This is probably one of
the most primitive cases : —

Roy (6) : " How did the lake begin ? — There was a
hollow and somebody filled up one end. — How did the hollow
begin ? — It was there, some man made it. — What is a river ?

METEOROLOGY 327

— It is a hollow with water in it. — How did this hollow
begin ? — Some man made it. — Where does the water come
from ? — When it's warm the water comes. — What does that
mean ? — It's the heat. — How is that ? — Because we per-
spire and then we are wet. — Where does river water come
from ? — From a little tunnel.- —Where does the water from
the tunnel come from ? — From a ditch (canal). — And the
water from the ditch ? — Some man took the water from a
fountain and put it in pipes. — But how did water start on
the earth, has there always been water ? — No. — Where
did water come from at first ? — There were a lot of men who
spat a lot." And it was here that Roy told us what has
been already related in § 5 about the rain.

The interest of this case lies in the physiological origin
that the child attributes to water. It comes from spitting,
and from what one knows of little boys' interests, it is
probable that this phrase is only a polite way of expressing
ideas still more prosaic. It might seem like a poor joke
to suggest that children think of micturition as the prob-
able origin of rivers. But experience has shown us with
certainty that the image crosses children's minds even
whilst they are being questioned.

Ju (7) states, like Roy, that river-beds have been dug
out by men and that the water comes from fountains and
pipes : " And how did the water begin in the pipes ? . . .
(Ju turns very pink.) — Say what you think. It doesn't
matter if you are wrong. ... — From the water-closet.
..." (At this point, after he had blushed redder and
redder, Ju's eyes filled with tears, and so we changed the
conversation.)

Her (7) : " How did the water in the rivers begin ? —
It is the water which comes when it rains. . . . Sometimes
it is water from the closet. That goes into the drains and the
drains go into the Arve." As to the river-bed : " They dug
a deep hollow."

But here again the memories of deaf-mutes furnish
decisive evidence : —

D'Estrella in the autobiographical letter sent to William
James and intended to complete the account of his
memories of childhood, adds this as to the origin of the
ocean. He went to the sea one day with his companions.

328 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

They bathed and it was the first time he had ever been in
the sea. He knew nothing of its saltness nor of the
strength of the waves. He was knocked over with his
eyes and mouth open and but httle short of drowned,
having no idea how to swim. He felt himself drifting and
instinctively began to crawl on the sand, spitting out the
water and wondering what made it so salt. He thought
it was the urine of the all-powerful god, the " great strong
man " who was hidden behind the hills.

But it is clear that most children have not the capacity
to frame these hypotheses whilst they are being questioned.
They suppose the water to have been artificially manu-
factured but they are unable to state how.

Rev (6) : " Was the lake there when your father was
little ? — No, not then." The lake is a hole which someone
made. " Where does the water in the lake come from ? —
From the fountain. — And the water in the fountain ? —
It comes front a tap, and the water comes out of the hole, and
then the boats go on it. — Who made the water in the tap ? —
A man. — How ? — He put it in the tub and then it ran out."

Grim (5I) says the lake is a big hole : " How was the
hole made ? — By digging. — Who did the digging ? — Some
men. — What for ? — To put water in it. — Or do you think
perhaps it came by itself ? — No. — Where did they dig the
water from ? — From the fountains. — Where does the water
in the rivers come from ? — From the ground. — And the
water in the ground ? — From the fountains. — And the
water in the fountains ? — From the lake. — And the water
from the lake ?■ — They fill up buckets and pour them into
the lake."

Rat (8) : " Where do the streams come from ? — From
the lake, sometimes from the Arve.— Where does the Arve
come from ? — / don't know, some people poured water into
a big hole. — And what is the hole ? — Sume people dug it. —
And where does the water come from ? — From the foun-
tains.— And where does the water in the fountains come
from ? — / don't know, I think someone made it. — How,
what with ? — / don't know, with something. I think it was
with the earth that they made it."

These examples could be multiplied indefinitely, but
they are all alike. This first stage on the average con-
tinues up to 7 or 8 years. The second stage contains
children, who, whilst maintaining that the rivers have

METEOROLOGY 329

been dug out by man, affirm that the water comes perhaps
from the rain or perhaps from a spring fed by rain. The
second stage continues on the average up to about the
ages of 9 or 10. Here are some examples : —

Bab (8 ; 11) : " What is a lake ? — It's a big round thing,
a hollow where there is water. — Was there already a lake
when your father was little ? — Yes. — And when your
grandfather was Uttle ? — Yes. — And when the first man
lived in Geneva ? — No. — Which is the oldest, the lake or
Geneva ? — The lake. — How did it begin ? — It was water
which fell. — Where from ? — From the sky. — And the big
round thing ? — // was dug out. — By whom ? — By some
men. — Who were they ? — Workmen." The case is the
same for the rivers. " Which were there first, the bridges
or the rivers ? — The bridges. — The bridges were made
first ? — Yes. — Why ? — To cross over. — Why ? — Because the
holes were there although there was no water in them."

Gen (7) : " How did the Arve begin ? — With the rain.
— And how was the hollow made ? — With machines."

Bar (9I) : " How did the lake begin ? — With rain —
And the hollow? — It was dug by men. — How? — With
pickaxes. — A long while ago ? — Yes. — Which was there
first, Geneva or the lake ? — Geneva." As to the Arve, " It
was dug by some men. — Why ? — To make the river. — And
where does the water come from ? — From the rain. —
How ? Where did it fall ? — On the ground. — Where ? —
On the ground, it soaks into the ground. — And then ? — It
flows into the river."

BuL (11 ; 8) : " How did the lake begin ? — It was dug
out. — By whom ? — By some men. — When ? — A long time
ago. — Who were they ? — The people long ago. — Why ? —
To be able to go by boat to Lausanne " (!) (This explains the
question asked by Dell at the age of 6| : " Why doesn't
the lake go as far as Berne.") — Why ? — To be able to go for
a trip in the boat or to go fishing. — Why ? — To catch fish. —
Where do the fish come from ? — God and some men made
the lake and God put the fishes in it. — Was it God or men
who made the lake ? — No, it was God who made the lake. —
Where did he get the water from ? — He made the streams,
and the rivers met in the lake.- — Which is the older, Geneva
or the lake ? — Geneva . . . No. . . . the lake."

These few cases show how spontaneous artificialism is
in children because when they are taught, or discover

330 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

for themselves, that water in the rivers comes from the
mountains or the rain, they continue to think of the bed
of the river as artificial. Moreover, between the second
and the third stage, one finds a series of intermediate
cases which show clearly the extent to which artificialism
is rooted in their minds, if not as a formulated beUef at
any rate as a general trend of mind. The following cases
show, for example, in the form of natural explanations
(characteristic of the third stage), a tendency of mind that
is clearly artificialist (and derived from conceptions of the
second stage).

Chal (9) : " How was the lake made ? — It is water
which has collected in a hollow. — Where does the water
come from ? — From the mountain. — Where does the water
of the Arve come from ? — From the streams. — And the
water of the streams ? — From the mountains. — And how
was the valley of the Arve made ? — It was worn out by
the water. — Which is the older, Geneva or the lake ? —
Geneva. — Geneva or the Arve ? — Geneva. — Why are the
lake and the Arve just near Geneva ? — Because of the
streams which run down.— V\^h.y here and not anywhere
else ? — Because a lot of streams made themselves here. —
Why is the lake beside the town ? — Because it divides it
(Geneva lies in fact on both banks). — Why is the town
beside the lake ? — Because ihe lake is made beside it. —
Why ? — The streams come down to the town. — Could they
have made themselves further off ? — Yes, perhaps men
began it and the water of the river flowed into it."

Chal's artificiahsm can still be seen to underlie his
thoughts because against all probability he insists that the
town is older than the lake.

Par (9) : " Where does the lake come from ? — It is
water." " Where does it come from ? — From the streams
in the mountain. — Where does that come from ? — From
the sky when it's raining. — How was the hollow for the
river made 7- — It was dug out with pickaxes and also when
the water flowed down from, the mountain it made a hollow.
— Was it the water or the pickaxes ? — It was the water. —
Has Geneva always been there ? — Of course. — Was Geneva
there first or the lake ? — The town, you must have a town
before a lake, or else the water would overflow everywhere. —

METEOROLOGY 331

Do you know the Arve ? — Yes, I know it all. — Was the
town or the Arve there first ? — The town. They made
the town then the bridges, then it began to rain and then there
was water and it fell into the Arve and the Rhone."

This last case is a remarkable example of the tenacity
with which the artificiahst tendency asserts itself, even
in the midst of natural explanations. These last cases
are much more interesting than the primitive cases of
the first stage because the tendency of the child's mind
is seen more indirectly and, therefore, more reliably.

Two cases follow belonging to the third stage in which
the explanation of rivers and lakes becomes entirely
natural. In the most primitive of the cases in this stage
(for example the first of those to be quoted) it will be
seen that the explanation is not mechanistic at the outset
but that it passes first of all through a stage of eminent
artificiahsm. A certain finalistic dynamism is attributed
to the water which enables it to act for man's greatest
good : —

Bar (9:5): " Where does the lake come from ? — It
comes from the rivers. — How, was it dug out }—The water
hollowed it out. When the water was strong and there were
big waves it drove back stones. — Which is the older, Geneva
or the lake ? — Geneva . . . both at the same time.— Hov/
does it happen that Geneva is on the edge of the lake ? —
Because if there had not been a lake they would not have had
any water ! " The lake is thus explained by reasons which
are at the same time mechanistic and finahst, the mechan-
ism serving as a means to the end.

Bur (12 ; 7) : " Where does the lake come from ? —
From the mountain. — How ? — When there is snow on the
mountains. It melts. — How was the lake hollowed out ?
— By water. — And the rivers ? — Because the stones rolling
along hollow it out. — Which was there first, Geneva or the
lake ? — The lake. — Which was there first, the Rhone, the
Arve or Geneva ? — The rivers were first."

As regards the animism of children in these different
stages, we can assert once more that artificiahsm and
animism far from being mutually exclusive imply each
other. In fact nine-tenths of the children of the first

332 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

stage think of the water of lakes and rivers as being
conscious and alive, although they regard it as being
artificially made without generally defining how it was
made. As to the later stages, eight-tenths of the children
of the second stage and a third of those of the third stage
still think of water as alive and conscious, so that animism
decreases proportionately with artificiahsm.

We might proceed to examine the repHes of children
who did not know Geneva, but they are so similar to the
foregoing answers that it is unnecessary. We have had
the opportunity of speaking to children at Beaulieu-sur-
Mer and in the Valais about the origin of the Mediterranean
or of the little mountain lakes. Mile Rodrigo has under-
taken the same research in Spain and quahtatively the
replies are the same. The sea is " a big hole and people
have put water in it." — Where did this water come from ?
— From pipes and taps" (7 to 8 years), etc. At Paris
the problem is a different one for the children have not
had the same direct experience of the facts of nature as
they have at Geneva. Artificialism here is more extreme,
but the stages qualitatively are the same, it is only their
duration which varies.

CHAPTER X

THE ORIGIN OF TREES, MOUNTAINS
AND OF THE EARTH

We must now consider how the child explains the origins
of raw materials such as wood, stone, stuff, etc. These
questions are not raised in any formalist spirit, they are
problems which interest at least a large number of children.
In fact, all the questions that are considered here have
actually been put forward by children. Thus in the
collection of questions am.assed by Bohn ^ are to be found
the following which were all asked by the same child.
At 2 ; 6: "Papa, were theye people before us? — Yes. —
Hon- did they come there .^— They were born like us. —
Was the earth there before there were people on it ? — Yes. —
How did it come there if there was nobody to make it."
At 3| : " Who made the earth ? Was there ever a time
when we were not on the earth." At 4 ; 9 : " What are rocks
made of ? "

Mme Klein in an interesting study * records the following
quest ons between the ages of 4 and 5 : " Wie wird Holz ?
Wie wird Stein ? " (" How is wood made ? How is
stone made?"). The answer was given that stone had
always been there, but the child replied " Aber woraus
ist er hergekomnen ? " (" but what is it made out of ").
Other questions relate to the growth of trees, of flowers,
to the origin of dust, etc., in fact, all materials give rise
to spontaneous curiosity and the very form in which the
question is phrased shows in most cases that the child is
expecting an artificiahst explanation in return.

^ Pedag. Serrnn., 1916.

* Eine Kinderentwtcklung, Imago, Vol. VII, p 251.

334 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

§ I. The Origin of Wood and of Plants. — We find,
as usual, three stages in the evolution of the explanations,
namely, integral artificiaUsm, a mixture of artificialism
and natural explanation, and finally a purely natural
explanation. During the first stage, wood is considered
as having been artificially made from broken pieces of
furniture or else it comes from trees, but the trees have
been made by men, either by putting sticks in the ground
or else by sowing seeds made by ishopkeepers. During
the second stage the child understands that wood comes
from trees and the trees from seeds or roots and further,
the seeds are understood to come from the trees them-
selves or from other plants such as wheat, but men must
harvest them and labour in sowing them otherwise the
trees would not grow. Nature is not yet thought of as
being sufficient unto itself. During the third stage there
is at length an entirely correct explanation.

Here are some examples of the first stage which con-
tinues on an average up to 7 or 8 years of age. There are
two types of reply, those of children who have not learhed
that wood comes from trees and those of children who
have. These are examples of the first type : —

Dar (4) : " What do you do to get wood ? — / don't know.
— What do you think ?^ — You buy it. — Where from ? —
From a woman. — And what did the woman do to get wood ?
— She made it. — How ? — She stuck little bits together and
made a big bit. — And how did she get the httle bits ? —
They were made with nails. — How ? — By sticking them to-
gether. You plant the nails. You plant things in the wood.
— But the little bits, how does one get those ? — / don't
know, whilst they are working, big pieces of wood fall down."

For (4I) says that the wood comes "from the shop-
keeper." " And what does the shopkeeper do to get the
wood ? — He takes sacks. — And when he hasn't any more ?
— He buys some from another man." And so on in-
definitely.

Lug (7) : " What do you do to get wood ? — You push
it through a machine. — Do you have to put anything in
the machine or not to get wood ? — Yes, you must put
something. — What ? — You must put some shavings in."

THE ORIGIN OF TREES 335

RuD (7) says that the wood comes from the shop-
keeper who gets it from another shopkeeper and so on. As
to the first origin of wood it comes from " a man who
breaks up cupboards."

Let us now consider the cases of children better in-
structed who know that wood comes from trees and that
trees come from seeds. We shall see that their artificialism
remains entire even in this second case, because even
here the seeds are manufactured : —

Ter (6|) : " What do you do to get wood ? — They
make it with things. — With what things ? — With wood. —
And where does the wood come from ? — From the forest.
— How ? — God helps men to make the wood and then they
plant it in the ground. — Where do they get this wood
which they plant ? — First of all they make wood and then
they plant it in the ground. — Are there sometimes new
trees ? — Yes. — How are they made ? — You sow things. —
What ? — Things that you buy in the shops. — How do you
get seeds ? — They are made. — By whom ? — By people. —
What do you have to do to get seeds ? — You must have
round things. — Where do you find them ? — On the ground.
— Where ? — In the fields, you move away the grass and then
you take the seed. — How did they get there ? — They were lost
whilst they were being sown. — \Vhere did they come from ?
— From the shopkeeper. — And what did the shopkeeper do
to get them ? — They were sent to him from the factory. —
You don't find seeds ? — No, they are made."

Blan (6) : " What do you do to get wood ? — You cut
the trunks of trees. — What do you do to get trees ? — You
sow seeds. — And the seeds? — You buy them. — Where? —
In the shops. — And the shopkeeper ? — (thinks a little)
He makes them. — What with ?—With other seeas. — When
the first man came, were there already trees ? — No. —
How did they begin ? — With seeds. — Where did the seeds
come from then ? — From the shop."

It is plain that the origin of the trees remains arti-
ficialist. There is certainly no question of a creation
ex nihilo, a notion which appears neither in infant nor in
primitive cosmogonies. In trying to draw out the child,
one always ends in working round in a circle. The wood
is made of shavings, or the seeds are made of seeds.

336 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

During the second stage, the idea appears of the forma-
tion of the seeds by a natural process, but artificialism
is still vital to it in the sense that man continues to be
necessary for the reproduction of the trees. Here are
some examples : —

Due (6 ; lo) says that wood " comes from trees. —
And the trees ? — You plant seed and make it grow. —
And the seed ? — You have to buy it. — From whom ? —
From a shopkeeper. — And the shopkeeper, how does he
get it ? — He makes it. — How ? — With a machine. — How
do you make seeds with a machine ? — You put it in the
machines. — What is it you put ? — The stuff that grows on
the trees. — What ? — The fruit. — What do you have to do
to get seeds for fir-trees ? — You take the cones. — And what
then ? — You put them in the machine. — Can you make
seeds without taking anything from the trees ? — No. —
If there is no machine can you make the trees grow ?
—No."

Ah (7I) says that the wood comes "from the trees and
the trees come from the seeds. You get the seeds at the
factory. — Which factory ? — The seed factory. — What do
they do at the factory ? — They make them. — What with ?
— With corn. — Do you think that they make flowers with
com seeds ? — Yes." " If there were no people would
there be any flowers ? — No."

Naturally those children who know the country better
do not introduce the idea of the factory so much, but
nevertheless they believe that man is necessary to the
culture of plants.

Bouv (8) says that fir-trees grow from se?d. As to the
seed "you get it from the cones. — If there we'"e no people
wouldn't the firs grow by themselves in the forest ? — No,
because there wouldn't be anybody. — If there were nobody
wouldn't there be any seed ? — There wouldn't be any trees.
— Why ? — Because there would be no seed. — Why ? —
Because there would be nobody to take them."

This artificialist tendency is obviously deeply rooted
even in well-informed children, and even in the suburbs
of Geneva where all the children are familiar with the
countryside.

THE ORIGIN OF TREES 337

There is another interesting question to ask children,
and that is, why the leaves of trees are green. During the
first stage the child repUes as follows : —

Du (4) : " Because they have been painted."
Frez (4) says that " it is the men who have made the
trees in the mountains. — How ? — With wood. They found
the wood and they found flowers and then they put them on
the trees. — Why are the leaves of trees green ? — To make
the trees pretty."

Blan (6) says " They have been painted."

Children in the second stage reply in this way : —

Ol (6 ; 11) : " Because they are the new leaves which
have just grown."

Eyn (6) : " Why are the leaves green ? — Because some-
one has planted the seed. — Why are they green, and not any
other colour ? — Because it is the spring."

Gio (7 ; 2) : " It's the spring which has made them so
green."

IwA (9I) : " The tree turns them green. — How can the
tree do that ? — The roots make them green when the leaves
come out of the root. — And where do the roots come from ?
— From the seed. — What colour is the seed ?• — It's the
colour of flowers. — Have you seen blue seed ? — No. — Have
you seen blue flowers ? — Yes. — Well, how does that
happen ? — There is a little blue in the seed. — Can you see
this blue ?— iVo."

The {preformist) tendency of this last reply should be
noted.

The first stage continues on an average up to 6 or 7
years, and the second up to 9 years. The replies of the
third stage are correct as far as the origin of the seeds are
concerned, but children of this stage refuse to give any
judgment on the greenness of the leaves or else they give
the same repUes as those we have just seen.

§ 2. The Origin of Iron, Glass, Cloth and of
Paper. — Since these explanations do not provide muclr
interesting material, we can deal with them very briefly.

Amongst quite little children there is a stage which
appears to be pre-artificialist, but in reaUty it simply
denotes a period interior to a need for explanations.

338 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Oa (4) said of iron that " you find it, it makes itself all
alone." The same answers were given for paper and cloth.

Frez (4) gives the same repUes: " You find iron. —
Is it made or is it found ? — // is found. — Where ? — We
have found it at our aunt's."

Sal A (4) : " You catch it in water with your hands."

This reply was given for iron, paper, etc.

Evidently this stage, although coming before the period
of explanations, is preparing the way for artificialism, the
things being provided already, made in a cosmos organised
for the needs of man. In these circumstances the earhest
explanations will be entirely artificiaUst. Here is a clear
case of transition in point : —

Mass (6) : Iron " is found in the earth. — But where does
this iron in the ground come from ? — It has been put there."

The early explanations of the origin of matter are of
two types. Sometimes materials are manufactured out
of each other and sometimes they are made of pieces of
themselves. Here are some examples of the first type : —

Blas (5) : Iron is " made with wire," that is to say,
" with quite thin iron wire," and this latter is made with
" ordinary wire." Cloth is made " with grass." Glass is
made " out of ice."

Box (6) : Iron is made " with earth." So is glass.

Co (6) : Iron is made " with glass."

Ol (6) gives the same answer and adds that " You
must heat the glass to turn it into iron."

Fer (7 ; 9) : Iron is made of " scrap iron," and " scrap
iron " is made of " solder," and solder is made from the
" resin of trees."

Vau (6) : To make iron you put wood into machines
and to make paper you must put in glass.

Ru (7) : Cloth is made with " cobwebs," and paper with
" cock's-foot {Pattes de cog)." This last explanation comes
from the fact that in Geneva rags are known as " Pattes."

In short, machines are magic boxes which turn one
thing into another according to those external similarities
which seize the child's imagination.

Mme Klein, in an article that will be quoted later,
relates that her child at the age of 4 asked one day if the

THE ORIGIN OF TREES 339

spinach for dinner could be cooked long enough for it
to turn into potatoes. This testifies to the beUef in the
omnipotence of adult technique which we shall find when
studying children's notions of machines.
The second type of reply is as follows : —

Dar (4) says that iron comes from shops and that
little pieces are stuck together to make a big piece.

Ben (51) says that glass is made out of broken pieces
of glass.

Ol (6) : " You find old bits of glass and stick them
together."

But these replies are made at the same age as those
preceding, and are similar to them.

These facts are only interesting so far as they show the
tendency of the infant to believe in adult omnipotence.
During this same period everything in nature appears to
the child to be artificial or manufactured. Later, when
the child discovers by degrees that machines are neither
omnipotent nor mysterious, natural phenomena will
become more and more difficult for him to explain by
artificialism and this will give place to the purely physical
explanation.

§ 3. The Origin of Stones and of Earth. — The
question of the soil is much more interesting than that of
the foregoing materials. The child's conceptions are less
at the mercy of adult influence and of verbalism.

In raising the general question of the origin of stones,
a concrete example was used. The children were shown
a round smooth pebble hke those that they had all seen
on the banks of the lake or of the Arve, and they were
asked " Why is it round." When the child did not reply
that it was worn by water we added the observation, " I
found it on the bank of the Arve. Why do you think it is
round."

Three stages were observed in the explanations, namely
integral artificiahsm up to 7 or 8 years, natural explana-
tion from 9 to 10 years onwards and an intermediary
stage between the two.

340 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

During the first stage the earth and the stones are thought
of as having been made one from the other or both out of
little pieces of stone. Here are some examples : —

Dar (4) : Stones come from " a house. They are taken
from old houses. — On the Sal^ve there are stones, where
do they come from ? — They are planted in the ground. —
Where do they come from ? — It is hard to say ! They are
made of marble."

Sala (4) : The stones " have been made." As to the
earth " it is inside. — Inside what ? — Inside the stones."

Blas (5) : Stones " have been made " with " little bits "
of stone, and the earth " has been made."

Zal (5) : " It's the men who build houses who make the
earth."

CouR (5) : " Where do the stones on the Sal^ve come
from ? — It must be people that plant them." " How do
tlie stones begin ? — You put cement, then after you stick
them together, and then you hit them with a hammer and
that makes them stick. — What does it mean that the stones
are planted ? — You plant little pieces and then you put the
cement and then you stick them together."

Blau (6) says that there are stones even in the country
" because the seeds were put in the ground. — What sort of
seeds ? — Seeds of stones. — Where do they come from ? —
From the men. — What are they like ? — They are round. —
What use are they ? — Because they are planted. — What do
they do when they are planted ? — That makes the stones."

Hatt (7) : " The people took some gravel, sand and
pebbles and they made stones." The stones in the country
are there " because the men threw them there." The earth
was made by men.

Cuv (6) says that all the stones have been made by
builders out of earth, the earth is broken stone.

In the first stage then we find three explanations side
by side between which nearly every child wavers. The
first one consists in saying that the earth is made of
stones, and the stones are made of earth, with the possi-
bility of an intermediate material, such as sand. Secondly,
the stones are made of httle bits of stone which have been
left over. This is just what we have already seen in
connection with wood, where it will be remembered that
wood was said to be made of shavings. The conclusion

THE ORIGIN OF TREES 341

to which these two theories of the composition of matter
lead becomes clearer as the child's explanations grow
free of artificiahsm. This conclusion is an atomism united
with the idea of the condensation or rarefaction of a single
substance which is the basis of all kinds of soil. Thirdly,
there is in many children, though not in all, the idea that
the pieces of stone grow like plants. There are stone
seeds and stones grow from them. You plant them and
they grow, etc. These expressions do not seem to be
merely figures of speech, what follows suggests rather
that the child actually attributes life to the stone. But
we shall see, as the examples quoted already clearly
show, that this notion of life does not exclude that of
artificial manufacture. Stones are made, they are planted
and they grow.

These interpretations receive their best justification
from a study of the replies given by children to the question
of the smooth round pebble taken from the Arve. This
stone is indeed a concrete object with which the child is
perfectly familiar, from having played on the shores of
the lake or the Arve, and which it was possible to show
him instead of merely describing. Furthermore, the elder
children, even though they have just said that stones
were made by men, replied at once that the pebble had
been worn by the water, thus abandoning, when brought
into contact with the actual object, their belief in artificialist
myths. The younger children, on the other hand, retained
their customary trend of mind. The following replies
were obtained during this first stage : —

Frez (4) : " Do you see this stone, why is it round ? —
It is to put in the earth. — Do you know where I found it ?
On the banks of the Arve. Why is it round ? — It is to put
in the earth."

PoR (4I) : "It is because they are made round."

Blas (5) : "Do you see this stone, why is it round ? —

Because it is made of flour. — Do you know where I found

it ? On the banks of the Arve. Why is it round ? —

Because it's made of flow." Stones in general are made

342 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

by people " with white flour " (he means cement). The
pebble from the Arve is thus made hke all the rest.

TuL (5) : " Why is it round ? — Because it wants to he
round." " It is made quite round."

Eyn (6) : " Why is it round ? — Because it's not like the
others. — Why not ? — Because it wasn't made like the others.
— You told me that you find them, and now you tell me
that they are made. Which do you really beheve, that
they're found or that they're made ? — They grow in the
earth. — I found this stone on the banks of the Arve. Why
is it round ? — / don't know why, because it was found on
the bands of the Arve." It is clear that in this stage, the
terms " made " and " grown " are not contradictory.

WoL (7) : " It's round because it was made like that.'

Cuv {6|) : " Because it was made round. — What with ?
— With damp earth."

Blau (6|) : " Do you see this round stone, where do
you find stones Hke this ? — On the banks of the Arve. —
Why is it round ? — Because there are lots of round stones.
— How was it made ? — By some men. — Why is it round ?
— Because they made them round."

These facts confirm once again what has already been
shown as to the association between artificiaUsm and
animism.

Before coming to the purely natural explanations of the
third stage, we must distinguish and consider an inter-
mediary stage in which the child is partly artificiaUst,
though at the same time appealing to processes of natural
formation other than simply that the stone " Uves " or
" grows."

The following is an important case intermediate between
the first and the second stages : —

Rob (7) : " Where do stones come from ? — You find
them in boxes. You find a big stone. You break it, that
makes a little stone, and then you make a big stone with it.
(This is the process of decomposition and re-composition
with which we are already familiar) — Do you see this
stone ? Do you think you could make a bigger stone with
it ? — Oh, yes, you could take a big stone then you could break
it and that would turn it into a bigger stone. Oh, yes, that one
would easily make a big stone, it's heavy enough ! — Look at
this stone, why is it round ? — You find them like that and

THE ORIGIN OF TREES 343

you break them and then you make bigger round ones with
them. — Do you know where I found it ? On the banks of
the Arve. Why is it round ? — You break them and then
you make them round."

This case is very interesting. The weight of the stone
is used to prove the fact that you can make a big stone
with a little one. There is no question here then of a
simple process of manufacture, but of a process which
involves the capacity of the stone to be compressed or
expanded. The particular pebble referred to is compressed
and therefore heavy, and once it is broken in httle pieces
it can be made up again into a stone which is not so heavy,
but bigger. It is clear then that to the process of decom-
position and re-composition with which we are familiar
from the repHes in the first stage, a further conception has
been added here, that of condensation and rarefaction.
But this idea — in Rob's case still bound up with artificial-
ism, as evidenced by the suggestion of compressing the
stone — contains in germ the idea of particles of matter.
We shall see later that some of the children of the third
stage arrive more or less explicitly at this conception,
Rob's case is then intermediary between artificialism and
what may boldly be called atomism.

In the course of the replies of the second stage, arti-
ficialism can be seen to be progressively transferred to
nature itself.

Blase (6 J) : " Why is this stone round ? — To make
fire. — How ? — By banging on it. — What with ? — With a
hammer. — I found it on the banks of the Arve. Why is it
round ? — Because the Arve made it round with water. — How
did the water do that ? — It takes up earth and sticks it
together."

Ol (6 ; ii) says that men made the earth and the sand
and the stones. As to the pebble it is round " because it
was in the water. — What does that do ? — It makes it
swell." And 01 adds, " When one drinks too much that
makes one swell."

Den (7). The stones are made of " dry cement." Den
then changes his idea, " they made themselves all alone.
The earth made them. I have never seen it happen."

344 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Horn (5|, very forward in everything) : In order to
make a stone "you take some clay and make the stone. —
Have you been in the country ? — Yes. — Have you seen
stones on the ground. Where did they come from ? —
From the factory. — Here is a stone that I found on the
banks of the Arve. Why is it round ? — Because it made it
like that. — What ? — The water. — How ? — By making waves.
— And then ? — They rolled the stone and it got round."
After this excellent explanation Horn replied in connection
with another black-and-white pebble as follows : " Why
is this stone white on top and black underneath ? — Because
it is made of sand and of earth. — Why ? — Because it is
solid. — Who made it ? — The factory. — Do you believe that,
but I found it on the banks of the Arve ? — It is the water.
— What did it do ? — It turned it like that, it put the earth
on top."

It is quite easy to see the mechanism of these first
natural explanations. The child substitutes quite simply
a deliberate and artificial activity of water and earth for
human art. It is true that one could interpret each of
the expressions that have been recorded in a mechanical
and not an artificialist sense, but taken altogether such
an interpretation would not suffice for there is clearly
here an artificialism which has become immanent, and
which has been attributed to nature itself. In fact, all
the processes which the children refer to (swelling, dilation,
concentration, adhesion, etc.) are processes which in the
same conversation the children attributed to a human
technique, and in addition a systematic finalism is apparent
in all these conceptions. Later we shall see in studying
the explanations that children give of natural movements
{Causalite Physique) that waves and water, currents, etc.,
are spoken of until a very late stage as being produced by
a special dynamism and never as the product of a mechani-
cal process.

Here is an intermediary case between semi-human and
semi-immanent artificialism of the second stage and
physical explanation of the third stage : —

Gerv (ii) says that he wondered where the earth came
from : " / thought that it was men who had made it, but then

THE ORIGIN OF TREES 345

/ thought that that would have taken too long and would
have cost too much and also where would they have found
the dirt. — Well how did it begin ? — It came like that, some-
thing fell out of the clouds, the clouds fell down and made
the earth, the earth is just heaps of clouds. — And the trees ?
— When the earth was made they came out from under the
ground, there were little roots that came and gradually that
made a tree." With regard to the clouds, Gerve had said
a little earUer that they had come out of volcanoes.

Here are some cases of the third stage, that is to say
cases where the child explains the earth by the crushing
up of stones and stones by the compression of the earth,
but each of these explanations follow along lines which
are exclusively natural.

Bouv (9I) : " How did pebbles commence ? — In the
earth. — How did it become stone ? — It hardened. — Why ?
— It stayed there a long time and that made it harder. —
How ? — In the sun it was the heat that made it harder. —
Why ? — It dried it up. — If you break a stone what do you
have then ? — Little chips of stone. — If you break up these
little chips ? — That makes earth. — If you go on breaking
it what does that make ? — Tiny little stones. — And if you
break them ? — It makes dirt."

Bouv said that you end up by having " little crumbs of
earth."

Stoe (ii) : " What do you do to get stones ? — It's dirt
which makes stones. — How ? — Because it dries in the earth.
— And then ? — It makes stones. — If you take two boxes,
the same size, and put stones in one and dirt in the other,
which would be the heavier ? — The one with stones. — Why
does dirt which is lighter make stones which are heavy ?
— The dirt is pressed together until it becomes heavy. — How
does it get pressed together ? — Because it is warm. — What
is a stone made of ? — Of dirt."

Fal (9) : " How is stone made ? — It is sand which has
got hard. — And how did the sand begin ? — As dirt. — If you
break a stone what do you get ? — Sand. — And if you
break the sand, what do you get ? — Finer sand. — And if
you go on breaking it what do you get ? — It gets as small
as flour."

Weng (9:7): " How did stones begin }—With little
bits of metal. — What is that ? — You find it in the ground,
it's a sort of stone. — And how were the little bits of metal

346 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

made ? — With smaller bits of metal. — What are they made
of ? — Of dirt. — And how was the dirt made ? — With
pebbles. — How ? — By being broken. — What is earth made
of ? — It is made of little bits of metal. — What is that ? —
It's little bits of stuff all put together. — And if you break
them ? — You could not go on because then there would be
nothing at all."

Without falling into the temptation of supposing that
these children are putting forward an explicit atomism,
we may try to distinguish in these replies how much is
spontaneous and how much is suggested by the questions.
The spontaneous element is the idea that the stone and
the dirt are composed of the same material, but in varying
degrees of density. This conclusion is corroborated by
the idea put forward by children on the question of
weight (see Causalite Physique). Children of 7 to 10 years
always imagine that a body is heavier than another of the
same mass because it is more " filled up " or " packed."

From this notion to a rudimentary atomism is a short
step and the questions help the child to make this step in
seeking an explanation as to how stones are made (see the
case of Weng) or in asking what would happen if the
little pieces of stone were broken up (see the case of
Bouv).

Here is a still clearer case, and also a recollection of
childhood by an adult : —

Mart (ii|) : Mart was contrasting a smooth close-
grained pebble and a cork. " It's funny, the cork is big
and light and the stone is small and heavy, why is that ?
— // is because of what is inside the stone, there are lots of
little things, of sand, it is packed tight and there are lots of
little stones in it, but the cork has got little holes in it." After
that, a stone and some plasticine of the same size were
compared, and Mart said that the stone was heavier
because it was bigger. He was told that they were the
same size. " Yes," he rephed, " but look at it quite near,
it is not made in the same way. — What are the differences ?
— The stone has got a little more if you look at it hard. —
More what ? — More sand, more little bits."

THE ORIGIN OF TREES 347

Mart seems to think that the weight comes from the
abundance of corpuscles of which a thing is made.

A young man told us that he remembered among
other memories of childhood having tried at about 10 or
II years old to picture the composition of things like
earth, stones, leaves of trees, wood, etc. He decided that
it was the Uttle bits of them, spaced and grouped variously
which gave rise to all sorts of variety in consistency and in
appearance. He remembered particularly that the differ-
ence in a large dry leaf and a fine green leaf seemed to
explain itself thus.

We can conclude that the child's conception of con-
densation and rarefaction is a sort of transition from
explanation by the transformation of heterogeneous sub-
stances (air changing itself into water or clouds, for ex-
ample) and a true atomism. A point of comparison in
history can be made in the system of transition of
Empedocles, a consideration of which gives further point
to the replies recorded above.

But it must be repeated that before considering these
replies as really spontaneous, we must first analyse the
very suggestive explanations the children give of the
difference of the varying densities of objects.

§ 4. Origin of the Mountains. — The explanations
for the formation of mountains will allow us to define
the exact relations existing between animism and arti-
ficialism in the case of objects which are as evidently
inanimate as rocks or the earth.

Two stages were apparent in the collected replies. Whilst
natural explanation was the characteristic of the second,
on the other hand during the first stage the mountains
were held to have been made by man. But, strangely
enough, in half of the cases of the first stage, mountains
were pictured at the same time as living in that they had
grown. Here are some examples of this mixture of anim-
ism and artificiaUsm : —

Eyn (6) : " How were the mountains made ? — With
stones — How ? — A mountain came, God put stones inside.
— Inside what ? — Inside the earth. — And then ? — It grew

348 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

into a big stone. — It was a little stone before ? — Not so
very big."

Rob (7) : " How were the mountains made ? — Some
dirt was taken from outside and it was put on the mountain
and then mountains were made with it. — Who did that ? — //
takes a lot of men to make mountains, there must have
been at least four. They gave them the dirt and then they
made themselves all alone. — But if they wanted to make
another mountain ? — They pull one mountain down and
then they could make a prettier one."

Hen (7) said that the stones were put in the dirt, and
then it grew, but he could not say how.

CouR (5) said that " people had to plant the stones of
the Saleve," and then afterwards it began to get bigger
and bigger. " It was the grass which made them grow."

Ol (6 ; 11) said that the mountains were in the beginning
due to God and that they had grown, " and since then
they have always been growing." "Is the Saleve still
growing ? — No, because God did not want it to get any
bigger. — Were they made or did they make themselves ?
— God created them and then they made themselves."

Origin in manufacture and growth are not, it is clear,
contradictory for children. Obviously the child does not
suppose that the mountain is really conscious, but yet
when he holds that they have been made he still believes
that they have helped to a certain degree in the process
by growing and by making stones in the earth, etc. It is
not on inert matter that man works but on something
living. But for man nothing would be made, but with
his help certain activities of matter are stimulated.

There are other children of the first stage who do not
seem to share these ideas but one may doubt whether this
apparent lack of them is not a phase and whether at
moments they share such views. Probably it is a simple
question of emphasis, sometimes it is put on the act of
manufacture, sometimes on the activity of the thing
which is made.

CouR (6) : " How did the Saleve begin ? — With big
stones. — Where did they come from ? — People took them. It
was a man, lots of men. It was twelve men. — What did they
do ? — With stones.^ They took them. They put them on the

THE ORIGIN OF TREES 349

mountain. They put one stone then they made it like that,
pointed." " Which was there first, Geneva or the Sal^ve ?
— The houses came first and afterwards the stones."

Gill (7) : " How were the mountains made ? — They're

all of stone. — How did they begin ? — It was to make them

go all round. (Geneva is in fact surrounded by mountains.)

Big piles of stones all round. — What made it hke that ? —

. . . It was men who carried them there."

Rou (7) : The Sal^ve was made " by men. — Why ? —
It couldn't make itself all alone. — What is it for ? — For the
moon. — Why ? — For it to set behind."

The following is an example in which the mountain
although not manufactured is still conceived as existing
for the benefit of man alone : —

Due (6 ; 10) : Mountains " made themselves all alone. —
Why are there mountains ? — So that we can skate."

We have mentioned elsewhere {Language and Thought,
p. 173) the interesting question asked by Del at the age
of 6| : "Is there a little Matter horn and a big Matterhorn ?
— No. — Then why is there a little Salive and a big Salive .^ "
This question, in its very form artificialist, shows clearly
the spontaneity of the child's tendency to regard mountains
as " made for " us and in consequence as made by us.
To this question of Del, children of 7 rephed as follows
{Language and Thought, p. 227) : " (There are two Saleves)
because there's one for little children and 07ie for grown-ups."
" The little one's to climb and so is the big," etc.

Finally, after the age of 9 or 10 on an average, a second
type is found in course of which the children seek for
natural explanations : —

Den (8) : " It's the earth that has risen up. It's like a
big stone. — Did men make it ? — No ! "

Bout (9I) : " That's made with earth. — Did anyone
make the mountains ? — No. They're high with earth."

The conceptions concerning mountains thus clearly con-
firm what we saw with regard to earth and stones.

CHAPTER XI

THE MEANING AND ORIGINS OF
CHILD ARTIFICIALISM

It remains to be seen if from the outset there is a common
direction along which the different phenomena observed
are moving. We shall not hide the difficulties of the
problem — the replies collected may have been simply
made up, or they may have been due to the teaching
(religious or otherwise) the child had happened to receive
from its parents or from others, and even if these answers
show evidence of a spontaneous trend of mind they may
be heterogeneous among themselves. Is there then an
artificiaUsm belonging specifically to childhood ? Does
this artificiaUsm obey laws of development ? Can one
or more origins be assigned to it ? These are the questions
now to be examined.

§ I. The Meaning of Child Artificialism. — It does
not seem to us possible to explain all the answers classified
in the preceding chapters as due to romancing. If we
apply our three usual criteria we shall, in fact, find as
foUows. In the first place, children of the same average
age give the same answers. In this respect the explana-
tions of night as due to big black clouds and of the clouds
as resulting from the smoke from the roofs, etc., are so
many reactions whose generality is always striking.
Secondly, the artificialist answers are not limited to one
age or a single given stage, but they extend over at least
two stages. It is thus possible to see a progressive evolu-
tion of beliefs, which clearly shows their partially systematic
character and excludes the hypothesis of pure romancing

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 351

The third criterion, the arrival at the correct answer, is
significant. In fact, the children of the last stage do not
attain the correct answer or the natural explanation in
one bound but seem rather to grope for it and during
these gropings may be seen numerous traces of beliefs of
the preceding stages. Thus, amongst the children who
believe the Lake of Geneva to have been hollowed out
solely by the action of the water, may sometimes still be
found the idea that Geneva existed before the lake.
To explain how the lake came to be situated beside the
town, these children are obliged to turn to an immanent
artificiahsm just as in the eighteenth century God was
replaced by " Nature."

These three criteria, taken together, thus lead one to
suppose that, speaking broadly, the artificialist answers of
the children tested were not due to romancing.

Naturally, this conclusion does not mean that all the
answers obtained are to be treated as of equal value. On
the one hand, a careful distinction must be drawn between
the element common to all the children of a given stage
— for example, the idea that the sun was made by men or
by God — and the embellishments that such and such a
child adds to this conviction under the pressure of the
questions — for example, that it was made by someone
having lit a match. We have quoted the complete answers
because the study of these embellishments brings to light
many tendencies which would otherwise be missed, but,
as regards the general problem that concerns us here, we
may treat these individual elaborations as due to romanc-
ing and retain only the statement that is common to all.
On the other hand, it is obvious that the value of the
general element itself varies according to the age of the
children. Thus the attempts at natural explanations
made by the elder ones (9-10) may be taken more or less
hterally — the child who compares the sun to a condensed
cloud really means what he is saying and is not exagger-
ating his idea by the words used. The explanations of
the younger children, on the contrary, present a mixture

352 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

of spontaneous tendencies with romancings evoked by
the questions. Thus when a child of 5 states that the
sun has been made " by men," the essence of what he
means is simply that the sun has been made for us. Such
a chUd believes in consequence that the sun is dependent
on us, but generally without the question of origin having
ever been clearly present to his mind previous to our
questions. We must, therefore, seek what can have been
the spontaneous tendency behind the answer.

But this latent artificiahsm, which we maintain to be,
broadly speaking, independent of romancing may perhaps
be interpreted as the product of the education imposed
on the children either by their parents or by observation
of the hfe of their town. On one hand, the child is
taught that a God has created Heaven and Earth, that
all things are directed by Him and that He watches us
from Heaven where He dwells. There is nothing sur-
prising in the child simply continuing to think along the
same line and imagining in detail the manner of this
creation and supposing that God secured the help of a
band of skilled workmen. On the other hand, the child
is impressed by the industry he observes in his town
(although Geneva is situated very near the country and
all the school children are familiar both with fields and
mountains). Lakes and rivers are bordered by quays,
their beds are cleaned by dredgers, drain-pipes may be
seen running into them from the banks, etc. Thence to
conclude that nature depends on human activity miy
easily be but a short step.

But to this last interpretation may be opposed the fact
that nothing compels the child to see in these phenomena
only that which favours artificiahsm. Observation of the
clouds might provide the child equally with suggestions
favouring a natural explanation (their quantity, their
height, the way in which from the town they can be
watched forming round the mountains, etc.), instead of
leading him to considisr only the resemblance between
the cloud and the smoke from chimneys. Watching the

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 353

rivers and the lake might impress the child with their
size, the way the stones are thrown about, the wild nature
of the banks in the country, rather than exclusively with
the signs of human activity, etc. Such selection seems to
result from an interest in what is artificial, the spontaneity
of which can hardly be doubted.

To regard this artificialist interest as entirely due to
religious education is a hypothesis that cannot be borne
out by analysis. A very pronounced artificialism may, in
fact, be found among deaf-mutes or with children who
are too young to have understood or generalised the
religious teaching they may have received. The ideas of
the deaf-mute d'Estrella on the origin of the stars (Chapter
VIII, Introduction) and his ideas of meteorology (Chapter
IX) have, in fact, been given. Another deaf-mute,
Ballard, also quoted by James {loc. cit.), imagined that
thunder was caused by a great giant, etc. Also there are
the questions of children as young as the ages of 2 or 3
asking " who made the world ? ", " who puts the stars in
the sky at night ? " etc. Such questions have obviously
preceded any religious teaching. But, even supposing —
what is far from proved — that all the children between
the ages of 4 and 12 examined had been directly influenced
by the theology of the Book of Genesis, there remain three
reasons for maintaining that the artificialist tendency we
have noted is in part at least spontaneous.

In the first place, we have been struck by the fact that
the majority of children only bring in God against their
will as it were, and not until they can find nothing else
to bring forward. The religious instruction imparted to
children between the ages of 4 and 7 often appears as
something foreign to the child's natural thought, and the
conceptions evoked by this teaching lack both the subtlety
and the intricacy of convictions that make no appeal to a
divine activity.

Secondly, even if we admit that the child's artificiahsm
is an extension of the theological artificialism imposed by
education, it remains to be explained why the child, as

354 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

has been shown, thus extends to everything conceptions
wherein the religious significance remains so vague, and
still more why this extension obeys laws instead of differ-
ing from child to child. Thus why do all the youngest
children think that Geneva is older than the lake ? And
how shall we explain such a general tendency as that
which regards the night as made of black smoke, the sun
as a fire produced by the smoke from the roofs, etc. If
there was here nothing more than a simple extension of
a type of explanation they had been given, it would seem
that these conceptions ought to vary from child to child.
But such is not the case.

Thirdly, and this is the most important objection to
be opposed to the theory under discussion, the child's real
religion, at any rate during the first years, is quite
definitely anything but the over-elaborated religion with
which he is plied. As will be shown in the course of this
chapter, our results entirely support the thesis of M.
Bovet according to which the child spontaneously attri-
butes to his parents the perfections and attributes which
he will later transfer to God if his religious education
gives him the opportunity. In the problem that concerns
us now, it is, therefore, man who is thought to be omnisci-
ent and all-powerful, and it is he who has created aU
things. As we have seen, even the sun and moon and the
sky are attributed to the activity of man and not of God,
in at least half the cases. Moreover, when the child speaks
of God (or " des Bons Dieux," as several boys said) it is
a man they picture. God is " a man who works for his
master " (Don), " a man who works to earn his Uving,"
a workman " who digs," etc. In short, God is either a
man like other men, or else the child is always romancing
when he speaks of him, in the same way that he speaks of
Father Christmas and the fairies.

In conclusion, it does not seem possible to explain the
generahty and tenacity of child artificialism solely by
the pressure of education. We are, on the contrary, faced
by an original tendency, characteristic of child mentality,

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 355

and penetrating, as we shall attempt to show, deep into
the emotional and intellectual life of the child.

But the essential of the problem still remains to be
solved. Are the beHefs that have been Usted in the pre-
ceding pages reaUy " spontaneous convictions," that is to
say were they formulated by the child previous to the
questions or should they be classed as " liberated con-
victions," that is to say as beUefs aroused by the examina-
tion and thus systematised partly as the result of our
questions.

It is here best to adopt the simplest hypothesis. This
is that the majority of children had never considered the
questions we put to them. Therefore, the belief con-
tained in the child's answer was " hberated " by the
examination. Two elements thus contribute to this belief.
On one hand is the sum total of the mental habits or
tendencies of the child questioned, but, on the other, is a
certain systematisation due to the exigencies of the
question set and to the child's desire to answer as simply
as possible, so that the answers we obtained did not arise
specifically and directly from the child's spontaneous
artificialism. To liberate this spontaneous artificialism
it is necessary to delve beneath the surface and find the
true explanations that were certainly not in the child's
mind in that form before the examination. However
delicate an operation it may prove we shall attempt it.

We must first remember that the child's thought is
egocentric and as such intermediate between the autistic
and symbolic thought of reverie or dreaming and logical
thought. The convictions the child may have are, there-
fore, generally not communicable or at any rate remain
uncommunicated. Also even if nature and its phenomena
force children to contract a whole series of mental habits
they do not formulate any theory or verbal explanation,
in the strict sense of the term, which incidentally makes
the relative uniformity we noted all the more striking.
Such as it is, the child's thought is much more fertile in
images and is, above cdl, motor much more than conceptual.

356 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

It consists in a series of attitudes or motor schemas
organised in some degree as mental experiences. But as
yet nothing is directly formulable. Thus it is often found
in making little physical experiments with the child —
as, for example, submerging bodies in order to observe
the displacement of water — that laws are often correctly
foretold even when the verbal explanation by which the
child supports his judgment is not only false but even
contradictory with the implicit principles which dictate the
judgment (see CausaliU Physique, § 3). It follows that
a systematic type of reply such as was observed during
our study of the stages of artificialism, implies a sum
total of mental predilections in the child, although these
predilections may differ largely from the verbal explanation
put forward by the child during the course of the test.

How are these impUcit mental predilections to be defined
in the case of artificialism. In a word, the child conceives
every object, including the natural bodies, as, to use his
own terms, " made f or " a purpose. Now for a natural
object, such as the sun, the lake or the mountain, to be
considered as " made for " warmth, for boating, or for
cUmbing impUes that it is conceived as made " for man "
and consequently closely allied to him. It follows that
as soon as the child is asked or asks himself how the sun,
the lake or the mountain began, he thinks of men, and
his mental predilection, which translated into words
would be " the sun, etc., is made for man " finds utterance
in the formula " the sun, etc., is made by man." The
transition from " made for " to " made by " is easily to
be explained when one remembers that the child, whose
whole existence is regulated by his parents, regards every-
thing which is " made for " him as having been " made
by " his father or mother. Behind the artificialist formula
hberated by the questions, it would seem to be the anthro-
pocentric participation which constitutes the core of
spontaneous artificialism, and the presumption is strong
that this core is made up purely of feelings or mental
predilections. It is this that we hope to prove.

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 357

In trying to define the spontaneous tendencies which
explain the repUes obtained in connection with animism
it was found that the child's true animism, namely, that
which existed prior to our questions, is purely " pur-
p)osive " rather than explicit and systematised, except as
regards the belief that the sun and the moon follow us.
The child behaves as if nature were charged with purpose,
as if chance or mechanical necessity did not exist, as if
each being tended, by reason of an internal and voUtional
activity, towards a fixed goal. It follows that when a child
is asked if a natural body, such as a cloud or a stream,
" knows " that it is moving or " feels " what it is doing,
he replies in the affirmative because the transition from
purposiveness to consciousness is imperceptible. But such
a reply does not render the child's true thought, because
he has never asked himself the question and would not
have asked it except for our intervention, unless it were
at the moment when he was on the point of losing his
implicit faith in the purposiveness of things.

The artificialist replies given to our questions on the
origin of things justify us in making a very similar
analysis. We may go further and say that the mental
predilections which reveal the spontaneity of child animism
are practically the same as those which likewise reveal the
spontaneity of child artificialism. We shall understand
then why the child cUngs so tenaciously to artificiahsm
and by the same token why, at least at the outset, artificial-
ism and animism are complementary.

In fact, the child's purposiveness rests on the implicit
postulate that everything in nature has its own raison
d'etre in the form of an office or function that each object
is called on to perform according to its own characteristics.
In one sense this certainly involves animism, since without
awareness things could not succeed in playing their part
in the social organisation of the world. But this also
involves commands and above all commanders, to serve
whom is precisely the raison d'etre of the subordinate
bodies. And it is obviously man who is thus felt to be

358 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

the chief and the raison d'etre of things. The idea of
doubting such a principle so seldom occurs to children
that it is never expUcitly enunciated — it being granted
that a principle is never enunciated until the mind has
been faced by a problem, that is to say before the funda-
mentals of the principle have been directly or indirectly
put in doubt. Animism and artificialism constitute, then,
two attitudes of mind which are complementary to each
other. From this standpoint let us reconsider the three
groups of phenomena which seemed to testify to the
spontaneity of the child's animistic attitude, namely,
finaUsm, precausality, and the confusion between physical
and moral law.

In the first place, the child's finalism argues as much
as and even more in favour of the existence of artificialism
than of animism. Certainly, when he says that the sun
follows us in order " to warm us " he attributes purposive-
ness to the sun. But an examination of the definitions in
terms of function (Binet et Simon) show that most of
them are closely allied to artificialism. Binet, as is
well known, has shown that if children of 6 to 8 years are
asked " what is a fork " or a " mummy," they reply " it
is for eating with " or " it is for taking care of us," etc.
The universaUty of the definition in terms of function has
been confirmed by all who have checked the value of
Binet's and Simon's tests. Yet these definitions beginning
with the words "it is for . . ." ("c'est pour") cover the
whole face of nature and do not apply only to the objects
and persons in the child's immediate vicinity {Judgment
and Reasoning, Chapter IV, § 2). The same thing is found
when one is careful not to ask for a series of definitions
(which encourages perseveration) but when one asks point-
blank in the course of an interrogation : " What is a
mountain ? " or " What is a lake ? " A mountain " is
for climbing up " or " for skating," etc. A lake is " for
going on in a boat " or " for fishes " (in other words " for
anglers"). The sun is " for warming us"; the night
" for sleeping " ; the moon " for giving us light " ; a

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 359

countryside " for travelling in " ; clouds " for making
it rain " or " for God to live in " ; the rain " for water-
ing flowers," etc. That such a viewpoint, not only
finalistic but utilitarian and anthropocentric, should
necessarily be allied with artificiaUsm, in other words
that the definition " it is for , . ." should lead naturally
to the explanation "it is made for ..." seems quite
evident.

In the second place, we have seen that the pre-causaUty
evidenced by the questions and above all by the " whys "
of children between 3 and 7 forms one of the closest bonds
between animism and the rest of child thought. In fact,
precausahty supposes such a lack of differentiation between
the psychical and the physical that the true cause of a
phenomenon is never to be sought in the " how " of its
physical realisation, but in the purpose which underlies
it. But these purposes belong as much to an artificialist
order as to an animist order. To put it more clearly the
child begins by seeking purposes everywhere and it is
only secondarily that he is concerned with classing them as
purposes of the things themselves (animism) and purposes
of the makers of the things (artificialism) . Thus when
Del {Language and Thought, Chapter V) asks " Who
makes it run ? " when speaking of a marble on a sloping
surface, he is thinking of the purpose in the marble for
he adds " does it know you are there ? " — Here pre-
causality tends towards animism. But when Del asks
why there are two Saleves and not two Matterhorns, or
when he asks why the Lake of Geneva goes only as far as
Lausanne and not up to Berne, or when a child of 5 quoted
by Stanley Hall^ asks " Why is there a moon ? " and
" why isn't it as bright as the sun," etc., etc., it is of the
purpose of the makers of mountains, lakes and planets
that the child is thinking, or at least it is of men's decisions,
which evidently implies that men count for something in
the creation of things.

Finally, in connection with animism, we laid stress on

^ Pedag. Semin., 1903, Vol. X. "Curiosity and Interest."

36o CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

a phenomenon which we shall often come across again in
studying the explanations given by children as to the
causes of movement (see Causaliti Physique), that is to
say the lack of differentiation between the idea of the
physical law and that of the moral law. Thus the regular
reappearance of the sun and moon is due to the fact that
they " have to " warm us or give us light, etc. Now it is
quite clear that such a lack of differentiation bears witness
to a tendency of mind which is as much artificialist as
animistic. In fact, for children the moral law presupposes
commanders, that is to say men who give orders, as much
as bodies which obey. Certainly the sun must have some
degree of awareness in order to be able to obey but also
it must have someone whom to obey. This someone the
child may well have never explicitly defined in its thought,
yet it goes without saying that it is man, since man is
the raison d'etre of everything.

To conclude, if artificialism evidently does not exist in
the spontaneous thought of the child in such a systematic
and explicit form as it has necessarily assumed in the
course of our interrogations, it exists none the less in the
form of an original tendency of mind intimately connected
with finalism and child precausality. This in itself is
sufficient to justify our study of artificialism.

§ 2. The Relations of Artificialism with the
Problem of the Birth of Babies. — At any rate in the
earlier stages, the child seems to experience no difficulty
in conceiving beings as, at the same time, living and
artificially made. The planets are living, they grow, they
are born, and yet they have been made by man. Similarly
mountains, stones, even seeds grow and yet have been
artificially made. What is the reason for this combination
of animism and artificialism ? To solve this problem it
would be well to know children's ideas on the birth of
babies. But it goes without saying that there are grave
moral and pedagogic reasons for not pursuing such an
investigation directly. Since we cannot experiment here,
we must rest content with what can be found in children's

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 361

talk which has been published or which we have gathered,
and also with such recollections of childhood as bear on
this point. We shall find enough in these sources to
define broadly the ideas of children on the birth of babies,
and these ideas wiU enable us to understand the true
relations between animism and artificialism.

Two types of children's questions are to be distinguished
relating to birth, but it is not certain that these two types
characterise two stages. Questions of the first type do
not touch on the " how " of birth. There is no question
of causality, strictly speaking. The baby is assumed to
have existed prior to its birth and the child simply asks
where it was before that event and how the parents have
contrived to introduce it into the family circle. The
relation between parents and children is a simple bond
and not one of cause and effect : the baby is held to belong
to the parents and its arrival is considered as having been
wished and arranged by the parents, but no question is
raised as to how the baby has been able to come into
existence. Questions of the second type, on the contrary,
show that the child wonders how babies are made and is
spontaneously led to consider the parents as the cause of
its creation.

Here are some examples of the first type taken from
questions collected by Stanley Hall and his students : —

" Mamma, where did you find me ? " (F. 3 ; 6). " Where
was I when you were a little girl ? " (F. 5). " Where was I
when you were at school P " {G. y). " Where was I before I
was born ? " (G. 7). " Where does the doctor find children ? "
(G. 7).i

The first of these questions is typical, the baby being
clearly conceived as pre-existing the activity of the
parents. The last two are less conclusive for when thj
child asks " where ? " it may well be that he was thinking
of the location in the bodies of his parents.

^ Pedag. Semm., 1903, Vol. X, p. 338.

362 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

Rasmussen ^ notes on his daughter S. (3 ; 8): " Mamma,
where did I come from ? " and later " Where do people get
all these children from ? " Little R. (at 4 ; 10, that is to
say 9 months after having asked questions of the second
type as we shall shortly see) asked : " Where is the baby
now that a lady is going to have next summer ? " Mme
Rasmussen then replied : " It is inside her." To this the
child retorted : " Has she eaten it then ? " which certainly
seems to indicate the child's idea that the baby existed
independently of the parents.

To this type of questions must also be joined those
beliefs that have often been noted in children according
to which the dead become Uttle and are bom again as
babies.

" Do people turn back into babies when they get quite
old ? " (Sully, loc.cit., p. 105-107).

Del (6 ; 6) : " When I die shall I also grow quite small
(that is to say like a dead caterpillar that he had seen
shrivelled up) ? " [Language and Thought, p. 177).

Zal (5), when his uncle's death was announced to him :
" Will he grow up again ? "

S. (5 ; 4) : " When you die, do you grow up again ? "
(Cramaussel).* And then subsequently: " You never be-
come little," and " when you die you become . . . nothing."^
The latter negations show how strong the affirmations must
have been which impUcitly preceded them.

And Mme Klein's child : And then I shall die and you as
well. Mamma, . . . and then we shall come back again." ^

It is these questions of the first type which provoke the
ridiculous fables told by certain parents, according to
which babies are sent by angels, storks, etc. : —

" Where has the baby come from. Has God let the baby
fall down from the sky ? (G. 5 years) : " How did God send
the baby ? Did he send an angel with it ? — // you hadn't
been at home would it have taken it away again ? " (F.
7 years) : " Who is Dame Nature ? Did you know she was
going to bring you a baby," etc.*

^ Rasmussen, Psychol, de I'enfanf. L'enfant entre quatre et sept ans.

* Cramaussel, Le premier iveil intellectual de l'enfant, 1903, p. 165.
' Ibid., p. 167.

* Mme Klein, Imago, 1921, Vol. VII, p. 268.

* Pedae;. Semin., Vol. X (article quoted).

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 363

Now, one of two things must be true. Either the children
do not believe these stories, which happens more often
than would seem. Or else they partially believe in them
and try to find out how the parents were able to make
the baby come, starting from the implicit idea that it was
the parents who arranged its coming. This leads to the
question of the second type, to be examined next.

From the point of view of artificiahsm, how are we to
explain the questions of the first type ? It would seem at
first that artificialism is completely excluded. The child
does not ask how babies are made but where they come
from ? Babies pre-exist. This points to a stage anterior
to the need of explanation and, therefore, anterior to all
artificiahsm. But such a way of interpreting the facts is
obviously too simple. Behind what the child asks must
be sought what he does not express because it seems
evident to him ; it is the parents who make the baby
come, that is to say who arrange its arrival, whatever may
be the manner of the arrival. There is as yet no process
of making involved but merely a connection which the
child feels directly without having any need to state it.
There is thus a sort of pre-artificiahsm comparable to
the primitive artificialism we have often found with the
youngest children — the sun, etc., has been connected
with men from the beginning without having actually
been made by men.

On the other hand, questions of the second type reveal
the desire to understand the nature of the bond between
parents and children, the how of birth. Now an interest-
ing point is that birth is conceived by the child as being
an artificial process of production and, at the same time,
a process bearing on matter endowed with hfe, and either,
on the one hand, independent of the parents or, on the
other, the fruit of the bodies of the parents themselves.
In illustration of the first case the following examples
show birth identified with artificial production : —

One of Rasmussen's daughters, R., asked, at 4 years
and I month : " How are ladies made ? " Mme Ras-

364 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

mussen replied by asking the child why she asked the
question. " Because there is meat on ladies. — What ladies ?
— You and other ones." And then the child added, " /
think it's a meatmaker who makes them, don't you ? " At
4 years 10 months she asks again, " How are people
made ?" ^

Mile Audemars related the following spontaneous re-
marks. Renee (7) had just had a little sister. She was
making plasticine figures and pausing, asked : " Ma-
demoiselle, what part of my httle sister did they make
first ? The head ? " She was asked : " How do you
think a httle baby is made, Rende ? Hasn't your mother
told you ? — No, hut I know. Mummy still had some flesh
over from when I was horn. To make my little sister, she
modelled it with her fingers and kept it hidden for a long
while."

Sully 2 has quoted the remarks: "Mummy where did
Tommy (himself) come from ? " To which Tommy rephed
for himself : " Mummy hought him in a shop."

Zal (5), whose comment on his uncle's death was
quoted above, added : " Do we grow ourselves or are we
built ? " " Grow " (" pousser ") here obviously means
not get bigger {croitre) but to come quite alone. The child
asks if babies come by themselves (if they grow again Hke
the dead uncle) or if their parents make them. In the
latter case birth is considered as a process of production.

Cramaussel's daughter, S., declared at 5 years 7 months,
when she was told that God made the babies : " He uses
goat's blood for it, then."^

A httle girl asked where babies came from and added :
" / know already, I should go to a butcher and get lots of
meat and shape it."

These remarks make it clear how animism and artificial-
ism in the child's conceptions come to be complementary
and not contradictory. The idea of manufacturing living
material presents no difficulty since babies themselves
are manufactured. And as we shall see presently, ques-
tions about birth are often the starting-point for questions
on the origin of things in general. From its very roots,

^ Rasmussen, op. cit., pp. 48-51.

• Loc. ctt., p. 109.

• Cramaussel, op. cit., p. 130.

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 365

then, artificialism assumes the ideas of life and of artificial
production to be complementary to each other.

On the other hand, children come very early to grasp
the conception that the material out of which parents
make children is the fruit of their own bodies : —

Children's beUefs have often been quoted according to
which babies come from their parents' blood, from their
mouths, from their stomachs, or from their navels.^

A little girl of 4^ asserted that if she were to fall down,
she would break up into two little girls and so on.^

Clan, whose recollections have already been quoted
(Chapter IV, § 2) believed for several years that a son
simply came out of his father's penis for, as he said, he
had heard tell that fathers continued in their sons (" les
fi s sont le prolongement des peres ").

We have found ourselves, in those recollections of child-
hood we have been able to collect, the ideas, well known
to psycho-analysis, that the baby came out of the anus
and is made from excretum, or that it is in the urine, or
again that birth is due to a special food that mothers
consume for that purpose. Mile Audemars has called
our attention to the following observations : Dol (7^)
asked : " What do mummies eat to be able to make babies ? "
To which Ray (7) replied: " They must eat lots of meat
and lots of milk."

The interesting point is, that where the child knows
quite well — from having been told — that the baby comes
out of the mother's body, it continues to wonder as to the
manner in which each particular limb was made as if
there were a separate and special process for each organ.
Thus Mme Klein's child asked : " But where does its little
head come from ? " " Where do its little legs come from ? "
" Where does its little stomach come from ? " etc. Another
child, who had been told that a baby comes from its
mother's stomach, asked : " But how can she put her hands
in her stomach to make it ? "

In order to understand how these spontaneous in-
quiries by children into the problem of birth can have

^ Spi'elrcin, Zentralbl. f. Psychoanal., Vol. Ill, 1912, pp. 66-68.
* Spielrein, Intern. Zeitschy. f. Psychoanal., VI, 1920, p 156

366 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

a bearing on the development of artificialism we must
now try to determine broadly the chronology of questions
relating to the origin of things. As a matter of fact, the
spontaneous curiosity of children plays on the origins
of all things, and this point is fundamentally important,
since, in itself, it justifies the researches described in the
last three chapters. The most superficial examination
of children's questions between 3 and 7 years shows that
the child asks how the planets, the sky, clouds, wind,
mountains, rivers and ocean, raw matter, earth, the
universe, even how God himself, commenced. The most
metaphysical questions, such as that of the primal cause,
are raised at the ages of 6 or 7. Rasmussen's httle girl, R.,
was told at 7 years, that God made the first man. " Well,"
she replied, " who made God ? " etc. The important thing
is to find out whether the question on origins in general
precedes that on birth, and thus conditions its form, or
whether the inverse is the case.

Facts seem to furnish an unambiguous reply. The
succession of interests seems to be as follows : first an
interest in birth, then in the origin of the race, and at last
in the origin of things in general. Here are four groups
of facts conforming to this classification : —

Ballard, one of the deaf-mutes quoted by James
(Chapters VIII and IX), asked at about the age of 5 how
children were born. When he had acquired a rough idea
of the truth he began to wonder how the first man had
come into being. Thence his interest turned to the
birth of the first animal, the advent of the first plant,
and finally (towards 8 or 9) to the origin of the sun, the
moon, the earth, etc.

Bohn 1 noted in his son, questions asked in this order.
At 2 ; 3 : " Where do eggs come from ? " Having been told,
he asked: "Well, what do mummies lay?" At 2; 6:
" Papa, were there people before us? — Yes. — How did they
come there ? — They were bom just like us. — Was the earth
there before there were people on it ? — Yes. — How did it get
here if there were no people to make it ?" At 3 ; 7 : " Who
made the earth? " At 4 ; 5 : " Was there a nvummy before

^ Pedag. Semin., 1916.

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 367

the first mummy? " At 4 ; 9 : " How did the first man get
here without having a mummy?" Then finally at 4:9:
" How was water made ? " and " What are rocks made of ? "

Rasmussen's daughters seem to have followed the same
sequence. R., having asked how ladies were made, asked
a month later, " Who made the birds ? " — a question of an
artificiaUst character all the more interesting at this age
because no one had spoken to her of rehgion. At 3 ; 8, S.
asked how babies were bom, at 4|, how the first man had
begun, and a Uttle later where the first horse came from.
Her own reply was, " / think it must have been bought,"
which clearly shows that she thought it had been made
artificially.

But the clearest example is furnished by Mme Klein.
At 4I her child had begun to concern himself about birth.
The first question was phrased thus : " Where was I when
I had not yet come on the earth ? " Then came the question:
" How is a man made ? " (" Wie wird ein Mensch ? ")
which was repeated often. Following the question :
" Mummy, how did you come on the earth ? " The child
was given an explanation of childbirth, but several days
later, he asked again : " How do you grow big ? " " Where
does its little head and its litttle stomach come from ? " etc.
And then after these, came another series of questions :
" How do trees grow ?" " How do flowers grow ?" " How
are streams made? and rivers? and the dust?" "How
do boats come on the Danube ? " He also asked where
raw materials came from and above all, " Where does
glass come from ? "

We can assume then, that in all probability it is
curiosity concerning birth which is the starting-point of
questions of origin, so numerous between 4 and 7 years,
and in consequence the source of child artificiaUsm. It is
true that there will be children who ask questions about
origins before they ask them about birth but even here
the question arises whether it is not an interest in birth
which, thwarted and projected, is not at the root of these
questions about origins.

What is to be observed in any case — and the point must
be stressed so that the relation of the problem of birth to
artificiaUsm stands out more clearly — is an evolution of
myths relating to the origin of man in the sense of an

368 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

artificialism increasingly immanent, that is to say, attri-
buted to nature itself.

In fact, shortly after having occupied himself with the
question of birth, the child asks himself almost infallibly
what can have been the manner of the original appearance
of man on the earth. The younger ones, between 4 and 5,
respond with a purely artificialist solution, which involves
explaining man by man himself in a manner which actu-
ally only shelves the problem. That is Marsal's explana-
tion, a defective who will be quoted in the next section.
He explains everything by assuming a pair of ancestors
who have created everything. But amongst children of
7 to 9, very interesting solutions are to be found, according
to which man is descended from animals or plants and
these latter from nature herself. Nature becomes the
principle of artificial production in conformity with the
immanent artificialism which we have seen in children of
9 to 10 years. Here are two clear examples : —

Ballard, the deaf-mute quoted above, finished by con-
vincing himself that the first man must have been bom
from an old tree-trunk. Afterwards the notion seemed to
him to be stupid but he could not think of anything better
to replace it.

Vo (9), who was asked how Switzerland began, either
did not understand the question or confused the origins
of Switzerland with those of humanity and replied thus :
" Some people came — Where from ? — / don't know. There
were bubbles in the water, ivith a little worm underneath.
Then it got big and came out of the water and fed and grew
arms and teeth and feet and a head and it turned into a baby.
— Where did the bubble come from ? — From the water.
The worm came out of the water and the bubble broke and the
worm came out. — What was there at the bottom of the
water ? — The bubble which came out of the ground. — And
what happened to the baby ? — He got big and had babies.
By the time he died the babies had children. Later on some
of them became French, some German, some Savoyards. . . ."

The interest of this myth is clear enough even if it is a
piece of romancing. The relation of its content with the
Freudian symbols of dreams of birth is evident. It is

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 369

well enough known how frequently water is associated in
dream thought with the idea of birth. And again eggs
(frogs' eggs, etc.) and bubbles, being the symbols of eggs,
are frequently associated with the same motive. Finally,
the image of a worm often appears in dream symbolism
as associated with the idea of babies, etc. If once the
principle of the symbolism of subconscious thought is
admitted, even reducing assumptions to their minimum,
Vo's myth cannot be regarded as anything but the
symbolical transposition of the idea of birth. In other
words, the water would stand for the urine in which
children often believe babies are born (and we have seen
what a large number of children tend to ascribe lakes
and oceans to human activity on these hnes), the bubble
would represent an egg, the worm a baby coming out of
the body. All this urges Vo to beUeve that nature has
made man. If the principle of symbolism is not admitted
it is none the less <:lear that Vo has simply transferred to
nature what some years earUer he would have attributed
to man alone. In either case we see how nature becomes
the depositary of the productive activity of man.

To conclude, children's ideas on the birth of babies or
on the origins of man follow the same laws as their ideas
on nature in general, namely, artificiahsm as the starting-
point and natural explanation accompanied by traces of
immanent artificiahsm in the superior stages. But it
seems that the questions they ask about birth are the
source of those on general origin and not the inverse.
From this it appears that in the ideas of children on birth
lies the explanation of the basic interdependence of arti-
ficiahsm and animism. A baby being considered as at
the same time artificially made and living, the child has
the tendency to consider aU things as possessing the same
characteristics.

§ 3. The Stages of Spontaneous Artificialism and
THEIR Relations with the Development of Animism. —
We are now within reach of discovering on broad lines
the relations between animism and artificiahsm. To this

370 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

end, let us distinguish the four periods in the development
of artificialism and try to define, in connection with each,
what is the corresponding development in animism.

The first period is that during which the child has not
yet raised the question of the origin — in other words of
the manufacture — of things. The only questions about
origin are those asked in the form " Where does so-and-so
come from ? " and which have a spatial rather than a
causal end in view. If those questions about birth of the
first type constitute a stage at all (those which consist
in asking where the baby is before birth) it is here that
this first stage should be placed. During this period there
is, if one may use the term, diffuse artificialism. That
means that nature is conceived as being controlled by
men or at least as centring around them. But the child
does not try to define the manner of this activity and can-
not give any reply to questions about origin, and thus
this period is anterior to the first stages which we dis-
tinguished in analysing the manifestations of artificialism.
During this period magic, animism, and artificialism are
completely merged. The world is a society of hving
beings controlled and directed by man. The self and the
external world are not clearly delimited. Every action is
both physical and psychical. The only reality then is a
complex of purposive actions which presuppose active
beings and in this sense there is animism. But these
actions are either distantly or closely controlled by man,
and in this sense, there is an artificiahsm at least diffuse.
Moreover, this artificialism can just as well be magical as
direct, from the fact that man's will acts as well at a
distance as otherwise.

Take as an example of this stage Roy's first replies
(those reported in § i of Chapter VIII) — only a part of
them, it is true, for he already defines the origins of the
sun (a fact which could place them just as well in the
succeeding stage). The sun, Roy says, began to exist and
got bigger " because we began to exist " and " because we
got bigger." From his point of view, then, there is spon-

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 371

taneous life in things (animism) but there is also the
action of man on things. Only this artificialism is not
spontaneously accompanied by a myth about origins and,
further, it contains no magic element. Most children do
not get past this period as far as the majority of natural
bodies is concerned, but as soon as they try to define the
origins of any particular body they thereby pass into the
second period.

Or again, as examples of this first period may be taken
the most primitive of those cases where it is believed
that the sun, the moon and the clouds follow us. In the
one case, these heavenly bodies follow us voluntarily
(animism). In the other, their sole function is to follow
us and look after us by giving us Ught and warmth — they
are " made for us" (artificialism). And finally, it is we
who make them move (magic).

In short, during this first period the child projects into
all things the same relation which it feels to subsist be-
tween him.self and his parents. On the one hand, he feels
himself free and aware of his self. On the other, he knows
himself to be dependent on his parents and he conceives
them as being the cause of all that he possesses. Finally,
he feels between himself and them a mass of participations
even when he is separated from them.

The second period, which we shall call that of mytho-
logical artificialism, appears as soon as the child asks
himself questions about the origins of things or can reply
to questions which he may be asked on this subject.
From this moment, the artificiahsm which hitherto has
been diffuse becomes moie sharply defined in a number
of myths such as those we have recounted. Thus the sun
is no longer conceived as being simply dependent on men,
but as having been made by men out of a stone or a match.
Between these myths (usually " liberated " but some-
times spontaneous, as the study of children's questions
proves), and the diffuse artificialism of the first period,
there are at the roots — other things being equal — the
same relations as those that M. L^vy-Bruhl has stressed

372 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

as existing between the first stage of primitive mentality,
where participations are simply felt and hved, and a
second stage where participations begin to be formulated
and thus give rise to myths about origins.

It is to this period of mythological artificialism that
the first stage distinguished in the earlier chapters must
be assigned, that is, the stage during which there is integral
artificiahsm and where the sun, the sky, the night, moun-
tains, rivers, etc., are directly manufactured by men.
During this period animism and artificialism are still
completely complementary, things are manufactured and
living at one and the same time. Their manufacture is
comparable to the birth of babies, which are conceived
as having been to some extent moulded with the hands,
even when the child knows that the material of which they
are composed comes from the parents themselves.

This resemblance between manufacture and birth is
the more clearly marked during this period in that certain
natural bodies are conceived as coming out of man. These
notions are probably much more common than the children
have admitted. In any case, we have noted that the wind
has been identified with human breathing, fog with ex-
halation, rivers and the sea with spittle or urine, etc. If
one thinks of the symbohcal contents possible in autistic
conceptions, such as the highly probable associations
between water and urine and birth, between the earth and
birth (children tend quite spontaneously to connect death
with birth — dead people " grow again ") or even between
the sky, clouds and birth, it wiU be sean to what extent
the external world can be assimilated in children's latent
tendencies to a collection of UvJng bodies bound up with
human Ufe. Whatever these hypotheses may be worth,
there remains a whole body of fact, verifiable by direct
observation, which shows that during this period of mytho-
logical ari:ificialism things appear to the child to be at the
same time living and manufactured. Artificiahsm and
animism still imply each other without let or hindrance.

We shall call the next period that of technical artificial-

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 373

ism. It corresponds broadly with the second of the stages
distinguished in the prtceding chapters (when there are
three stages), that is to say conditioned (or mitigated)
artificiahsm (a mixture of natural and artificialist ex-
planations). In other words, this second period extends
from the ages of 7-8 to 9-10 on the average. Now, as we
shaU see later {Causalite Physique) this is the age which
marks the moment where the child's interest begins to
turn towards the details of machines and the proceedings
of human technique. It is, for example, at about 8 years
on the average that boys at Geneva no less than at Paris
are able to give from memory the correct explanation of
the mechanism of a bicycle. Generally speaking, the child
becomes capable of understanding a simple mechanical
operation (a steam-engine, etc.). Ideas about crafts and
the working-up of raw material become clearer. Such
facts, of course, react on artificiahsm. Hitherto, without
his asking " how ? ", the child has conceived aU nature
as being made by man, or even more, he has never thought
of doubting the comprehensive scope of human technique.
A machine seemed to him a box of magic out of which
everything could be produced from nothing. Henceforth,
on the contrary, the " how " of production becomes a
problem for him. To state this " how " is to state the
difficulties and to renounce belief in human omnipotence ;
in short, it is to learn to know reahty and its laws. Thence-
forth the reaction of these new interests on artificiahsm
will be thus. The child will continue to attribute to man
the general disposition of things whilst limiting his activity
to operations which are technically realisable. For the
rest, it is things which, set in motion by men have per-
fected nature by natural processes. At this point artificial-
ism is on the wane ; it is supported, in fact, by the laws
of nature. This is the mitigated artificiahsm which we
caU " technical artificiahsm." For example, the child no
longer asserts that everything connected with the cir-
culation of water is man's handiwork. He will say that
man fashioned watercourses and the beds of lakes, but

374 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

that water falls from the clouds by a natural process. The
planets are no longer the exclusive work of man — they
result, in the child's view, from the combustion and
condensation of smoke clouds, the smoke itself having
come from chimneys, etc. The explanation, it wiU be
seen, ceases to mythological. It becomes defined in two
senses, it demands of human technique only that which
the latter could reasonably be expected to produce and it
assigns to natural processes the task of perfecting what
man has inaugurated.

As to the relations between technical artificialism and
animism, in comparison with those of the preceding
periods they show a retrogressive movement — artificiahsm
and animism become contradictory. In point of fact, if
artificialism weakens it is because the resistance of
material things is in part recognised. For the purely
moral laws which, from the child's point of view, have
hitherto ruled nature, there is gradually substituted a
physical determinism. One may definitely assert that
during this period children no longer attribute hfe to
everything but they distinguish imparted movement from
inherent movement and attribute life and consciousness
only to those bodies animate with inherent movement
(the planets, the wind, etc.). As a consequence, the
manufactured bodies cease to be regarded as living, and
living bodies cease to be regarded as manufactured. From
this time on, children assert explicitly that such and such
an object cannot know or feel anything " because it has
been made."

Finally, towards the ages of 9-10 there appears a fourth
period of immanent artificialism. This period corresponds
to the third of the stages which we distinguished in the
preceding chapters (where the explanations offered by
children in respect of a given phenomenon were classified
in three stages), that is to say in the stage where the idea
that nature is made by man disappears entirely. But as
we often emphasised in connection with the details of
explanations given by children, artificialism is only

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 375

eclipsed then under its human or theological form to be
transferred simply to nature itself. In other words,
nature inherits the attributes of man and manufactures
in the style of the craftsman or artist. The facts, it will
be remembered are as follows. It is at first finahsm which
persistently outlives the artificialism of the later stages.
Thus the sun, even when it is conceived of as being entirely
independent of human manufacture, still is held to have
been " made for " the purpose of giving us warmth, Hght,
etc. The clouds, though due to natural evaporation, con-
tinue to be " made for " the purpose of bringing us rain,
etc. All nature is imbued with purpose. Next comes the
idea of the generation of bodies which is comparable to
birth — the stars come out of the sun and go back into it
sometimes, lightning condenses into planets or comes out
of the planets, etc. Then finally comes the idea of material
force, that is, of spontaneous activity attributed to each
thing of itself. The word " make " as employed by the
child on every occasion is, in this respect, very significant.
Nature itself thus becomes the depositary of the artificial-
ism of the later stages. Due allowances made, it is the
artificiahsm which M. Brunschwig has so admirably
treated in Aristotle's physics.

Naturally, the ideas of finality, of material force and
many others, current in this period, date from much
earher, and it is from the very beginning of its develop-
ment that the chUd endows things with human activity.
That is precisely what animism consists of, and in one
sense, one may, even in the earliest periods, call animism
an immanent artificiahsm. But the period now under
discussion which begins at about the ages of 9-10 is marked
by the junction of two very distinct currents, one of
which comes from the animism and the other from the
artificialism of the preceding periods. Thus certain char-
acteristics attributed henceforth to material bodies are of
animistic origin, such as the consciousness and the life,
with which about one-third of the children of this fourth
period still endow the planets. Other characteristics are

376 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

of artificialist origin as, for example, the idea of the
generation of material bodies by means of each other,
which seems to come from the idea of manufacture (all
artificial production during the second stage being
considered as concerned with hving matter). Finally,
most characteristics have an origin both animistic and
artificialist, such as the ideas of material force, integral
finalism, etc.

It is obvious that what has just been said of the third
and fourth periods concerns only the child's physics. In
the measure that he has received religious instruction, he
differentiates between physical and theological factors
during these periods, and the human or transcendent
artiftcialism of the first two periods comes to be trans-
ferred to God himself. In this case, the creation of the
world will continue to be interpreted in terms of an
integral artificialism whilst the detail of the phenomena
will be interpreted in terms of natural processes and of
an artificialism increasingly immanent.

§ 4. The Origins of Artificialism. — It would be
fantastic to try to assign a sole originating cause to child
artificiahsm. A phenomenon so complex can only be
the product of many factors. We shall distinguish here,
as we have done in the cases of animism and magic, two
sorts of causes, those of an individual nature, that is
those bound up with the consciousness which the child
derives from his own activity, and those of a social nature,
that is those bound up with the relations felt by the
child to exist between him and his environment and
particularly between him and his parents. But whereas
individual causes appeared to preponderate in the cases
of animism and magic, in the case of artificialism it is the
social causes which carry most weight.

Social causes are two in number, namely, the bond of
material dependence which the child recognises as existing
between himself and his parents and the spontaneous
veneration in which he holds them.

Under the first head we can be brief. From the outset

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 377

of liis conscious life, the child is immediately dependent
on his parents' activity for food, com^^ort, shelter and
clothing which is all organised from above for him in
accordance with his requirements. The most natural idea
for him, the idea he cannot escape from without doing
violence to his habits is that all nature centres round him
and has been organised by his parents or by human beings
in general. " Diffuse artificialism " can be considered
then as the immediate product of the feeUng of material
dependence which the child bears towards his parents.
As to mythological artificialism it may be presumed, as
we have already shown, that it is the problem of birth
which stimulates its appearance. But the problem of
birth is once more the problem of the parental function.
The child feels himself to belong to his parents, he knows
that they determined his arrival. Why and how ? The
trend of this interest plays a considerable part in the
artificialist solutions which the child proffers.

The second point, namely, the deification of parents
will also not detain us long. M. Bovet in a series of
remarkable studies^ has deduced from child psychology
a whole theory of the origin of religion which is of supreme
interest in this connection.

Psychoanalysts have shown that between the different
manifestations of love — filial, parental, and sexual love,
etc., there is not heterogeneity but identity of origin.
Floumoy, inspired by this view, has tried to prove, parti-
cularly in his Mystique moderner that religious emotion
is nothing other than sublimated sexual emotion. M-
Bovet, trying to widen the field of survey by studying
not only mysticism but religion in all its extension has
been led to reverse the terms of the problems. If in fact
there is a relationship between sexual love, mystic love,

^ P. Bovet, " Le sentiment religieux," Rev. de Thiol, et de Phtl.
(Lausanne), igig, pp. 157-175. "Le sentiment filial ct la religion," /ftjd.,
1920, pp. 141-153. And principally Le sentiment rehgieux et la psychologie
de l enfant, Neuchatel and Pans (Delachaux et NiestleJ, 1923, p. 173.

* Th. Flournoy, "Una mystique moderne," Arch, de Psych., 1915
(Vol. XV).

378 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

and the love of a child for its mother, must one regard,
as Freud does, filial love as sexual and incestuous, or are
the diverse forms of love to be regarded as differentiations
of one primitive fihal love ? This is not only a question
of terms. In religious psychology, the line of demarca-
tion is very clear. Sublimated sexual love, it is true,
does not cover the whole of religious emotion. But on
the other hand, the transference and the sublimation of
the primitive filial sentiment furnishes the key to the
problem. The essence of religious emotion is, in fact, a
mingling sui generis of love and of fear which one can
call respect. Now this respect is not to be explained
except by the relations of the child with its parents. It
is the fiUal sentiment itself.

Here are the facts. The child in extreme youth is
driven to endow its parents with all of those attributes
which theological doctrines assign to their divinities —
sanctity, supreme power, omniscience, eternity, and even
ubiquity. We must scrutinise each of these points for
they lead straight to the very core of artificiaUsm.

It is a common observation that babies attribute to
their parents complete virtue. As M. Bovet has remarked,
the proof of this lies in the gravity of the crisis provoked
by the discovery of a fault and particularly of an injustice
in the parents. The case may be recalled, which we
quoted from amongst some recollections of childhood, of
the child who, accused and punished in error, ended by
convincing himself that he was guilty of the fault with
which he was charged.

The supreme power of the parent is still more essential
to the point of view with which we are deahng. There
are many instances on record of children attributing
extraordinary powers to their parents. A little girl asked
her aunt to make it rain.^ M. Bovet quotes Hebbel's
recollections of childhood. The child, who thought its
parents all-powerful, was staggered to find them one day
lamenting over the sight of their fruit-trees ravaged by

1 Spielrein, Arch, de Psvch., Vol. XVIIT, p. 307.

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 379

a storm. There was then a limit to his father's power !
Spontaneous conduct such as this can be instanced in-
definitely and our own data confirm in the clearest manner
M. Bovet's thesis. Not only is it evident that the omni-
potence, with which the youngest of the children we have
examined endow mankind in general, must be derived
from the unlimited powers which they attribute to their
parents, but furthermore we have often come across
precise evidence in the shape of facts bearing directly on
the point. We have frequently asked children if their
fathers could have made the sun, the Saleve, the lake, the
earth, or the sky. They do not hesitate to agree. Here
is a myth which is very significant, in which the omni-
potence of the parents is, it is true, transferred to a
symbolic plane but nevertheless remains quite clearly
defined : —

Marsal (20) is a defective who, it will be remembered,
told us not without some romancing, that the sun had
been thrown up into the air, hke a balloon, by his ancestors.
We asked him what these ancestors were : " / think there
must have been some one to make them. — And what about
God ? — Well, to tell the truth I don't much believe in God.
To my mind there must have been something that started the
human reign. — How did it come about ? — God couldn't
have taken little bits and made a man. The two sexes must
have come together. There was an old man, not tremendously
old, but old all the same, and he had a woman with him who
was about the same age." Marsal had begun to adopt a
serious air. We asked him to describe this woman. He
said : " Her face is rather like my mother's. I like my
mother more than anything in the whole world." As to the
old man he naturally is like his father, without a beard,
with the same features and the same eyes. He is simply
a little younger. These are the ancestors who, according
to Marsal, built the earth and made the sun come forth
from volcanoes.

Such a myth evidently symbolises what little children
are limited to feeling within them, namely, that the world
was made by their parents.

As to the omniscience that the child attributes to his

38o CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

parents, it is revealed clearly enough by the crisis pro-
voked when he finds his parents out in ignorance or error.
Here as usual the child's convictions are implicit, not
formulated and even informulable, and it is only when the
conviction decays that it is seen to have existed. A very
clear fact related by M. Bo vet is the recollection of Edmund
Gosse of first hearing his father say something which was
not quite true. The passage which is of the greatest
interest should be read in its full context.^ Here we
shall only quote the following : " Here was the appal-
ling discovery, never suspected before, that my Father
was not as God, and did not know everything. The
shock was not caused by any suspicion that he was not
teUing the truth but by the awful proof that he was
not as I had suppoired omniscient."

We have already remarked the following case : Del, at
6^ (see Language and Thought, Chapter V) asks questions
in a way which impHes that there is an answer to every-
thing and that the adult knows the answer. " Why do
you ever make mistakes?" he once asked his teacher?
At 7 ; 2, Dell asks fewer questions about fortuitous occur-
rences as if he had given up trying to justify everything.
We put to him then his own questions of the year before
and he found them absurd and insoluble. " // Papa does
not know everything how can I," he once said. In the
interval Del had passed through a crisis of scepticism in
regard to adult knowledge, a crisis such as M. Bovet has
described and which is of great importance in the child's
thought. In fact, at the time when Del believed in adult
omniscience, he considered the world as a harmoniously
regulated whole from where chance was excluded, whereas
during the period of scepticism of which we are now
speaking he renounces the idea that everything is to be
justified and is ready to admit chance and natural causes.

Parents are also held by younger children to be in-
dependent of time. Children have asserted to us that
when t^f^ir daddies came into the world, the lake was not

^ K<imund Gosse, Father and Son. Chapter II.

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 381

yet hollowed out and the Sal^ve was not yet built.
Marsal's myth has just shown how children tend to con-
ceive their parents as being anterior to the origin of things.

Finally, in connection with ubiquity every one can recall
the feeling of being followed and watched which guilty
children experience. The happy child also believes him-
self constantly to be known, understood and accompanied.
Adult omniscience expands into omnipresence.

Such then seems to be the starting-point of the filial
emotion — that parents are gods. M. Bovet has very
justly remarked in this connection how the notion of
God, when imfK)sed in the early stages of education, is
useless and embarrassing. Insistence on divine per-
fection means setting up in God a rival to the parents,
and M. Bovet has quoted some very curious facts to
illustrate this point. If, on the other hand, such insistence
is not made and the child is left to his spontaneous con-
ceptions he jinds nothing very sacred about God. He is
just a man hke anyone else, who lives in the clouds or
in the sky, -but who, with this exception, is no different
from the rest. "A person who works for. his master."
" A man who earns wages," these are of the type of
definition that working-class children of about 7-8 give
of God. The child's remark has been quoted who, watch-
ing some navvies at work, hailed them as " Gods " (" des
Bons Dieux "). A great number of children have also
told us that there were many Gods, the word for them
being generic, just as are the words " sun " and " moon "
for children who believe in the existence of numberless
suns. In short every time that children have introduced
God into their answers, it has been romancing (as if God
were a fairy or a Father Christmas), or otherwise, has
been to assign to God an activity which is, in truth,
human. Certain children, for example, have hesitated in
attributing the lake to God or to men, saying : "I don't
know if it was God or some men who did it."

Then comes the crisis. There is necessarily a Hmit to
this deification of the parents. M. Bovet says : " For a

382 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

long while the existence of this rationalistic and philo-
sophical period round about the sixth year has been
affirmed ; it is generally put forward as an awakening of
intellectual curiosity ; v/e believe it should be regarded
rather as a crisis, intellectual and moral at the same time,
similar in many ways to that of adolescence." ^ The con-
sequences of such a phenomenon are evident. The feelings
experienced by the child up till now towards his parents
must be directed elsewhere, and it is at this period that
they are transferred to the God with which his education
has provided him. It has been said that the child
" divinities " his parents. M. Bovet retorts with reason
that it can better be said, that he " patemalises " God,
at the moment when he ceases to regard his parents as
perfect. From the point of view of which we are treating,
the powers ceded to parents come to be progressively
attributed to more men or to older men and ultimately
to " early man." Or finally, in certain cases, the crisis
proceeds to such lengths that it is artificiaUsm en bloc
which is called in question. However, in general, a more
or less attenuated artificialism survives for some years
after the crisis at the age of 6 to 7.

To conclude, it is clear enough how far the fiHal senti-
ment may be the source of artificialism. The parents
being gods, it is obvious that from the child's point of
view, the world is due to their activity or to that of men
in general. It will be clear also why we have not dis-
tinguished in detail between human and divine or theo-
logical artificiaUsm, They are certainly not to be dis-
tinguished at any rate until about 7 or 8 years. Either
God is a person or men are gods, or else God is the chief
of men, but it is by the transference of the filial sentiment.
Above all it is clear how original child artificiaUsm is,
both in its origin and in its manifestations. It would
be in consequence an error to attribute it to reUgious
education imposed from above and badly assimilated
by the child.

* Bovet, he. cit., 1919, pp. 170-1.

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 383

If we pass now to the individual factors which have
produced or encouraged artificiahsm, we find facts which
are much more prosaic. But as psychoanalytic studies
have shown, children's thoughts are moulded by narcissist
interests — even by " auto-erotic " interests, as Freud
terms those which attach themselves to all organic func-
tions— as much as by parental complexes. The individual
factors of artificiahsm will then be two in number, namely,
the feeling of the child that he is a cause, on the one hand,
thanks to his organism, on the other, thanks to his manual
activity in general.

The first point is more important than it may seem,
but being bound up with all sorts of taboos and repressions
we only found faint traces of it in our interrogations. It
has been shown how interested the younger children are
in their digestive processes and in micturition, and we
have seen clear traces of thoughts about micturition in
the beUefs relating to the origin of rivers. Having studied
the notions of children on the air and the wind (see
CausaliU Physique, Chapter I), it would be hard to doubt
that respiration (in the shape of the production of wind)
and even wind in the intestines plays a part in forming the
child's conception of the world.

The second point is all important. The child's thought
is in close connection with his muscular activity. Stanley
Hall ^ has shown very clearly the extent to which children's
curiosity is related to manual experiments and to the
destruction of objects. The observations of Miles Aude-
mars and Lafendel at the Maison des Petits at the Institute
of Jean-Jacques Rousseau have shown how far manual
work is essential to the child's mental development.
These excellent teachers have come to distinguish three
stages in the child's mental development in connection
with the relations between thought and manual activity.
During the first stage (3-4) the child's thought is
" stemmed by action." This is the stage of manipulation.
During the second (5-7) " there is henceforth an aUiance

1 Pedag. Sem., Vol. X, 1903.

384 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

between motor and mental activity." " action provokes
thoughts." During the third stage (after 7 or 8) " work
becomes orderly, movement is controlled by thought,
because thought precedes action." ^ The full significance
of these statements comes out when it is remembered to
what an extent at the Maison des Petits, the groundwork
of arithmetic and of the whole intellectual life of the child
is spontaneously derived from manipulation and from the
spontaneous adaptation to the exigencies of manual
games. That is to say that thought, directly it becomes
conscious of itself, is connected with making things.
Mach, Rignano and Goblot have defined reasoning as a
" mental experience," or a construction in thought. With
regard to the child it is almost a " manufacture of thought"
of which we should speak.

Finally, to be complete we must mention a factor
accessory to artificiahsm, namely, language. It is evident
that the verbs " to make," " to form," etc., that we
apply to nature are pregnant with artificialism. But it
is also evident that language is not enough to explain
child artificiahsm, here, as usual, there is simply con-
vergence between the regressive tendencies of language
and child mentality. Moreover, as always, the child is
original ; it is not so much the word " to do " (faire) as
the words " to get done " (faire faire) that he most often
uses (" le vent fait faire avancer les nuages," " le soleil fait
faire pousser les fleurs," etc.). This expression " faire
faire " has a significance that is both animistic and arti-
ficialist, it imphes an external motor force and an internal
principle of reaUsation.

§ 5. The Origins of Identification and the Causes
OF THE Decline of Artificialism and Animism. — It
cannot be actually as the result of experience that the
child comes to abandon his animism and his artificiahsm.
No direct experience can prove to a mind inclined towards
animism that the sun and the clouds are neither alive

1 M. Audcrnars and L. Lafendel, La Maison des Petits de I'Institut
J. -J. Rousseau. Neuchatel and Paris (Delachaux and NiesUe), 1923.

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 385

nor conscious. Neither can adult teaching undeceive the
child, since the child does not speak of his animism enough
to make the adult expressly seek to supplant it, and also,
the child animist incorporates into his own mentahty
even the best lessons, whatever their subject. As to
artificialism, it rests on tendencies of mind that no observa-
tion of things will echpse until precisely such time as the
child is ready to abandon all its preconceptions.

The direct pressure of reality on the child's mind
cannot, therefore, explain the decline of animism and
artificialism, so much as a change in the general trend
of its mind. To what must this change be ascribed ?
The answer varies according as attention is directed to
the social or to the individual factors of animism and
artificiaUsm.

As regards the social factors, the crisis M. Bovet de-
scribes in which the child reaUses first that his parents,
and then that men in general are not all-powerful and do
not rule the world is enough to account for the decline of
transcendent artificialism. This crisis has evidently a
reaction on animism, in leading the child to regard things
as much less preoccupied with our doings than they at
first seem.

As regards the individual factors, that is to say the
factors in this continual assimilation of the world to the
self, which causes the child to treat all things as personal,
as hke ourselves and as gyrating around us, it seems that
the progressive decrease in the child's egocentricity is
enough to explain how he gradually comes to assume an
objective standpoint in regard to things and consequently
to abandon the ideas of participation on which animism
and artificialism are nourished. Now, the decrease in
egocentricity which becomes very marked after the ages
of 7 or 8 is due as has been shown elsewhere {Language
and Thought, Chapters I-III) to the manner in which child
thought becomes progressively socialised.

Liberation from the bond that ties him exclusively to
his parents and the freeing of his own point of view or

386 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

self seem thus to be the two principal factors that explain
the progressive decline of animism and of artificialism.
How next is the progressive evolution of artificialist
causality into the higher forms of causality to be explained ?

These higher forms, which the child attains spon-
taneously, are, as has been shown, causality by identi-
fication of substance, the form modelled on the notions
of condensation and rarefaction, and a certain primitive
atomism or synthesis of elements.

The attempt to see identity is very clear in the stages
above the ages of 7 or 8. The sun and the moon are
identified with the clouds or the air. From the air arise
steam and water on the one hand, and fire on the other.
Lightning is occasioned by the transformation of the clouds
of smoke into fire. Earth and rock are conceived as two
aspects of the same substance, etc. But these trans-
formations imply condensations and rarefactions. The
sun is made of air or of wind that has been " squeezed,"
rock is compressed earth and earth is rock broken up
into particles and dust. Finally, these condensations
and rarefactions suppose the existence of particles or
elements and this is clearly shown by children of the age
of II or 12.

It would certainly seem, therefore, that, as M. E.
Meyerson would have it, the first positive form of causality
is identification. Only, identification involves a past. It
cannot arise aU at once and the identifications made by
intelligence during the different periods of its development
have neither the same value nor form. What was identi-
fied by the pre-Socratics we to-day distinguish and what
we identify appeared heterogeneous to the pre-Socratics.
What then is the genesis of identification in the child ?
As far as we have been able to observe the genetic pro-
gression appears to be as follows.

The child starts by establishing dynamic participations
between things — the clouds and the rain are attracted to
one another ; cold, frost and snow are attracted to one
another; the wind and the clouds act on one another;

CHILD ARTIFICIALISM 387

the clouds act on the sun, driving it or chasing it or
attracting it, etc. At the stage when all things are man-
made and aUve, these participations merely imply series
of actions at a distance half psychical, half physical, with-
out any real community of being. Certain of these
dynamic participations, however, are already continued
into participations of substance, that is to say that bodies
separated in space are sometimes conceived by the child
as directly resulting one from the other (see Chapter IV,
§ 2, the examples of the air and the shadow).

According as man ceases to be a god in the child's
eyes and as nature appears less to gravitate around us
and our interests, the child seeks to explain things by
means of themselves. Participations between things and
ourselves have so far given rise to myths concerning the
manufacture of things by man. Henceforth, and accord-
ing as things become detached from man, participations
between the things themselves give rise to myths of
generation. The sun is the offspring of the clouds, the
lightning and the stars are produced by the sun, the
wind has collected together to form a cloud, etc. We
say generation and not yet strictly identification, since
things are still regarded as alive and conscious and
because the child does not at first state the nature of the
transformation. These myths are entirely comparable
to the myth of Vo {§ 2) according to which man has been
produced by a worm that has come out of a bubble from
the bottom of the water.

From generation to identification strictly speaking,
there is only the difference which separates d5mamistic
from mechanistic thought ; according as things are
deprived of life and spontaneous force, the transformation
of the clouds into tlie sun and moon, or of the wind into
cloud, becomes mechanistic and the child then turns to
the form modelled on notions of condensation and of
atomistic composition. But to explain how children arrive
at the necessity of mechanical explanation we must know
how they explain natural movements. This involves a

388 CHILD'S CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD

detai'ed study of child physics and the analysis of the
explanations children give not only concerning the origin
of things but concerning the detail of phenomena and the
way in which transformations and movements take place.
This will be attempted in the sequel to this work La
Causaliti physique chez V enfant.

APPENDIX

Note on the relations between belief in efficacy and
magic, in connection with §§ 2 and 3 of Chapter IV

In order to dispel all ambiguity we think it useful to say
in a few words why we have taken the Hberty of using
in child psychology the term " magic," which is custom-
arily restricted to a purely sociological use.

In the course of discussions on this subject with I.
Meyerson (see p. 157), a difference has arisen between us.
I. Meyerson, amongst others, has pointed out that the
idea of magic implies actions and beUefs having a collective
aspect. This involves in the first case a question of fact,
which is, that in all the examples described the magic fits
into a social setting. But this is not a chance, a mere
fact of circumstance. Reflection would seem to suggest
that the content and the form of magical phenomena are
bound up closely enough with social actions and with
communication between individuals ; its symbolical and
formal character, its grammar and its S3mtax imply an
adaptation, and more often a long adaptation, to the sum
total of the rites and habits of the group — the language
of magic, that is, has a history. The actual form of a
spell can show traces of its chaiacter. The nature of a
conviction must be influenced by the belief that it affects
the Hfe of the entire group. These " reverberations "
give it not only increased strength but the character of
an action with a definite and productive end. A pro-
tective conviction which is effective is a different thing
from a belief In an evil spell which fails.

Thus, on the one hand, the case of spells or charms

390 APPENDIX

does not exhaust the whole of magic, even from the point
of view of pure psychology ; on the other hand, it is
doubtful whether the nature, and above all the degree,
of the belief in spells is the same in the collective cases
of adults as in the individual cases of children.

In the cases of children themselves, it is perhaps possible
to make certain distinctions : —

(i) In some cases appeal is made to an external power,
much more than to a genuine action exerted on
the world. In these cases it may be doubted if
the question of a spell really arises or if it is a
question of oscillations in psychological tension
and of attempts to raise this tension by means
of processes such as those so well treated by
P. Janet.

(2) In other cases there has been personal " experi-

ence " accompanied with success and application
to a second event appearing in similar conditions.
This may be regarded as a form of causal sequence
or motive, more nearly approaching a spell than
the former, but distinguished, however, by two
characteristics. On the one hand, there is cer-
tainly present sequence and succession — I. Meyer-
son, holding that cases of supposed causality and,
above all, of magic spells suppose some kind of
simultaneity between the event and the gesture
or rite necessary to bring it about ; as he has
pointed out elsewhere, the " cause " is in this
case an aspect or part of the event. On the other
hand, the belief the child places in this sort of
action is weak and not continuous, in opposition
to the strength and continuity of the belief in
magical spells.

(3) Finally, there are the cases where at the basis of

the child's belief, lies a " social " belief (that is, a
general belief or one that the child believes to be
general or widespread). For the child, to be

APPENDIX 391

general means equally to be necessary ; to have
a quality of inevitability. According to I. Meyerson,
only the combination of a child's wish with a behef
of this type can give rise to cases which may
legitimately be compared to cases of magic spells.
And here a distinction must be made between the
beliefs the child has acquired from the adult
social world and those of strictly childish origin.

This last case would be according to I. Meyerson the
most favourable. He would suppose a society of children
with its own beliefs, rites or rite-games, rites of initiation
and of membership, rites of progression and of creation,
rites of exclusion and penalties, language and symbolism
— all corresponding to the desires and fears of children
as distinct from those of adults. The Boy Scouts with
their own special games, songs and sjrmboHsm, prove, in
his opinion, that it is possible in societies where there is
a firmer solidarity than in ours, to find groups of children
organised in this way. Such a study would certainly be
profitable. It would alone make it possible to see both
the original nature of magical causahty to the child and
the nature of the phenomenon of magic apart from its
efficacy. Like every research of social psychology it would
naturally have to embrace the study of the phenomenon
in its period of full sway, in full social activity ; the study
of the acquisition of its behefs by the individual child ;
the study of their variations under the action of social
factors and individual experience, and the study of the
loss of its behefs.

The general significance of all these remarks is that to
create an atmosphere of magic there must have been a
long period of conformity to it.

For our part we fully realise that in all adult society,
magic is an eminently social reality and that behef in
magical efficacy, therefore, possesses an intensity and a
continuity that make it incomparable with the weak and

392 APPENDIX

extremely discontinuous beliefs of children. We are also
convinced, like I. Meyerson, that in the functioning of
any social institution, it is hopeless to try to separate the
social from the individual factor ; the social process and
its reverberations in individual minds are one and the
same thing, or, more exactly they form two aspects of
the same reahty. We have thus chosen our vocabulary
without any intention of identifying individual childish
beliefs with primitive social beliefs or of opposing a social
psychology to sociological research after the manner of
G. Tarde.

We have simply made the following working hypothesis.
It has seemed to us that amongst the very numerous and
complex characteristics of magic described by sociologists,
the belief in efficacy at a distance was the hardest to
explain psychologically by studying it in relation to social
life instead of isolated by itself. We have, therefore,
assumed, solely as a working hypothesis, that there was
continuity between the purely individual idea of efficacy
and the idea impHed in the social beliefs of a magical
type. This does not in the least suggest that the social
beliefs have not — precisely because they are social — an
infinitely greater power of coercion and crystallisation.
It means simply that they are made possible by means
of an individual psychological substructure.

From this psychological point of view we thus define
" magical " phenomenon by the idea of efficacy at a
distance and we distinguish two types : —

(i) Individual child magic, in which the belief is weak
and probably discontinuous ; and

(2) Magic strictly speaking, or collective magic, char-
acterised by various qualities sui generis, amongst
them being a much more intense and systematic
belief.

It is precisely because of this attempt to seek continuity
in the development of the idea of efficacy that the behefs
quoted in § 2 of Chapter IV were all strictly individual

APPENDIX 393

child beliefs, that is to say, that they had escaped adult
influence and broadly speaking were not due to com-
munication between child and child.

Evidently it would be desirable to supplement our study
of the notion of efficacy at a distance by a complete
research into the constitution of the child's social magical
beliefs. It is here, according to I. Meyerson, that the
psychological analysis of what is strictly speaking magic
should begin. In our opinion, on the contrary, such a
research should be made in conjunction with a study of
individual beliefs in efficacy.

In the absence of such work on the children of savages
or on societies of civilised children, we may suppose,
according to the material collected in connection with
§ 2, Chapter IV, that with children this social magic
consists above all in a consolidation of the behef in
efficacy, a consolidation that naturally becomes aU the
firmer according as the child succeeds in absorbing adult
social behefs or practices.

The following is an example : The young man who
told us his personal procedure when playing marbles
(p. 142) recalls the following collective fact. He and his
friends had the habit, although Protestants, of making
the sign of the cross on the marbles they were about to
play with to make them go well. In so far as the memory
is exact, this custom arose simply from an act of imitation,
and ended by the progressive formation of a rite accord-
ing to which each player adapted himself to tlie idea that
it must be efficacious. The same young man has the
impression that such practices were much richer and
more complicated ; but he can only recall this detail.

A particular case such as this obviously proves nothing.
We shall, therefore, leave the question open, whilst stating
that the designation of " magic " to denote the individual
behefs described, is simply intended to permit the idea
of a continuity between the notion of efficacy implied in
these beliefs and the notions imphed by the strictly social
magical rites. Apart from this question of terminology

394 APPENDIX

and the working hypothesis involved, we are entirely in
agreement with Meyerson's criticism. In particular we
agree firmly with him as to the necessity of distinguishing
what are, strictly speaking, beliefs in efficacy (whether
individual, like those characterising the cases quoted in
§ 2 of Chapter IV, or social), from the simple means of
protection intended to relieve the psychological tension,
and from the forms of causality dependent purely on
phenomena that lie at the basis of sequence or succession.

INDEX OF NAMES

Aristotle, 223, 253, 375
Audemars, 67, 364, 383, 384

Baldwin. 34, 35, 36. 128, 131, 169

Ballard, 239

Bally, 84, 248

Bergson, 235

Binet, 10, 358

Bohn, 243, 333, 369

Bonald, de, 71

Bovet, 150, 208, 247, 268, 354,

381. 382
Brunschvicg, 253, 254
Burnet, 191

Compayr6, 56
Cramaussel, 362, 364

Delacroix, 86, 130, 148, 161, 164,
166, 189

Egger, 131
Empedocles, 48, 347

Feigin, 92

Ferenczi, 247

Flournoy, 138, 377

Frazer, 151, 158

Freud, 142, 151, 165, 234, 246

Goblot, 384

Gosse, 124, 135, 380

Hebbel, 150, 378

James, 131, 148, 208, 257, 272,

286, 300, 327. 353, 366
Janet, 128, 162, 390
Jerusalem, 249

Klein, 150, 333, 338, 365, 367
Klingebiel, 285

Lafendel, 67, 383, 384
Leuba, 148

L^vy-Bruhl, 88, 132, 169, 371
Luquet, 56, 70

Mach. 34, 35. 178, 384

Maine de Biran, 235

Malan, 50

Meyerson, E., 368

Meyerson, I., 150, 157, 319, 389.

391, 394
Michelet, 242
Miiller (Max), 250

Nagy. 17
Naville, F., 67

Oberholzer, 150

Pratt, 208
Pre-Socratics, 304, 310

Rasmussen, 210, 362, 364, 366,

367
Raymond, 49
Reverdin, 150
Ribot, 234, 244
Rignano, 384

Simon, 10, 358

Sintenis, 208

Spielrein, 150, 265, 378

Stanley Hall, 48. 209, 256, 359,

361
Stern, 30, 39, 43, 249
Sully, 39, 56, 92, 104, 148, 209,

213. 255, 362

Tarde, 392

Wallon, 130
Wulf, 247

395

GENERAL INDEX

Adualisms, 34, 35, 119

animism, among primitives, 170,
178, 250 ; distinction between
diffuse and systematic, 236 ;
distinguished from participa-
tion and magic, 133, 221, 250 ;
distinguished from realism, 237 ;
social factors favouring per-
sistence of, 243

anxiety, 164

artiftcialism, distinguished from
romancing, 352 ; immanent,
374 ; mythological, 372 ; tech-
nical, 374

Boy Scouts, 391

children, drawings by, 56, 70,
III ; finalistic attitude of, 231,
232, 358 ; questions by, 4, 5,
256, 366

children's ideas of birth, 360 ; of
clouds, 298 ; of dynamics, 221;
of force, 227 ; of God, 268, 269,
272, 280, 352-4, 381 ; of iron,
glass, cloth, and paper, 337 ; of
mountains, 347 ; of night, 291;
of the origin of water, 326 ; of
the omniscience of parents,
379; of rain, 311 ; of rivers,
lakes and sea, 326 ; of the sky,
287 ; of snow, ice and cold,
320 ; of stones and earth, 339 ;
of thunder and Ughtning, 307 ;
of wood and trees, 334

confusion between dream and
reality, 91, 92 ; between in-
ternal and external, 60, 86, 87,
120, 124, 129 ; between living
and inert, 229, 236 ; between
matter and thought, 86, 87, 124;
between physical and moral
necessity, 232, 248, 360 ; be-

tween self and universe, 125,
126, 250 ; between sign and
thing, 60, 86, 87, 102, 120, 124

consciousness of self, 124 flE. ;
absence of, 127, 152, 255

conviction, liberated, 11, 13, 14,
182, 355 ; spontaneous, 11, 12,
182, 355 ; suggested, 10, 15

dementia praecox, 4
dissociation of reality, 125, 127
dreams, and reality, 91. 92 ; organ
of, 90 ; origin of, 89, 96, 97 ;
place of, 89, 96, 97 ; retribu-
tive quality of, 100, loi ; sub-
stance of, 99

egocentricity, 6, 33, 125, 152, 167,

221, 244
ejection, 35

forgetting, 128

God, children's ideas of, 268, 269,
272, 280, 352-4, 381

identification, 386

imitation, 31, 128 ; involuntary,

in adults, 162 ff.
indissociation, of consciousness,

236 ; primary and secondary,

237 ; tertiary, 244
introjection, 236, 242, 244
introspection, 125, 240
intuition, 125

language, 30, 31. 248, 249, 384

magic, 132, 133 flf., 389 ff.
mythomania, 16
myths of generation, 387
manual activity, 383

39e

GENERAL INDEX

397

names, origin of, 63 fiF. ; place of,

71 S. ; value of, 80 ff.
narcissism, 151

objectivity, 34
observation, 4

paranoea, 7

parents' omniscience, 379
participation, 132, 133 fif. ; dy-
namic, 386
pedagogical considerations, 302,

315. 385

perseveration, 15, 90, 171, 205

precausality, 359

primitive, animism, 170, 178, 250;
magic, 132 ; participation, 132;
372 ; physics, 178, 319

projection, 34, 35. 241

psycho-analysts, 35, 377

purposiveness attributed to ob-
jects, 231. 357

random answer, 10, 18

realism, absolute, 126 ; immedi-
ate, 126; mediate, 126; dis-
tinguished from animism, 237

reality, dissociation of, 125, 127

relativism, 126

religious teaching, 52, 269, 270,

272, 353. 354
retribution, 247

romancing, 10, 16, 246, 300, 368
" rotting," 16

self, 33

self-esteem, 128
social environment, 153
solipsism, 152
subjectivism, 126
symbolism, 134, 161, 368, 369,
379. 391

tests, 3

transduction, 159, 167

verbal suggestion, 15. 214
vision, 47 ff.

International Library of Psychology,
Philosophy & Scientific Method

Editor: C K Ogden

(Demy 8vo)

Philosophy

Anton, John Peter, Aristotle's Theory of Contrariety 275pp. 1957.

Black, Max, The Nature of Mathematics 242pp. 1933.

Bluck, R.S., Plato's Phaedo 226pp. 1955.

Broad, C. D., Five Types of Ethical Theory 322pp. 1930.

The Mind and Its Place in Nature 554 pp. 7525.
Burtt, E. A., The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science

A Historical and Critical Essay 364 pp. 2nd (revised) edition 1932.
Carnap, Rudolf, The Logical Syntax of Language 376pp. 1937.
Cornford, F. M., Plato's Theory of Knowledge 355pp. 1935.

Plato's Cosmology, The Timaeus of P\ato 402 pp. Frontispiece. 1937.

Plato and Parmenides 250 pp. 1939.
Crawshay-Williams, Rupert, Methods and Criteria of Reasoning

572pp. 7557.
Hulme, T. E., Speculations 255 pp. 2nd edition 1936.
Lazerowitz, Morris, The Structure of Metaphysics 262pp. 1955.
Mannheim, Karl, Ideology and Utopia 360pp. 1954.
Moore, G. E., Philosophical Studies 550pp. 1922. See also Ramsey, F.P.
Ogden, C. K. and Richards, I. A., The Meaning of Meaning

With supplementary essays by B. Malinowski and F. G. Crookshank
394 pp. 10th Edition 1949. (6th Impression 1967.)
Ramsey, Frank Plumpton, The Foundations of Mathematics and other

Logical Essays 31 8 pp. 1931.
Richards, I. A., Principles of Literary Criticism 312 pp. 2nd edition. 1926.

Mencius on the Mind. Experiments in Multiple Definition
190 pp. 1932.
Smart, Ninian, Reasons and Faiths 250pp. 7555.
Vaihinger, H., The Philosophy of As If

428 pp. 2nd edition 1935.
Wittgenstein, Ludwig,Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 275pp. 7522.
Wright, Georg Henrikvon, Logical Studies274pp. 7557.
Zeller, Eduard, Outlines of the History of Greek Philosopohy

248pp. 13th (revised) edition 1931.

Psychology

Adier, Alfred, The Practice and Theory of Individual Psychology

368pp. 2nd (revised) edition 1929.
Eng, Helga, The Psychology of Children's Drawings

240 pp. 8 colour plates. 139 figures. 2nd edition 1954.
Koffka, Kurt, The Growth of the Mind 456 pp. 16 figures. 2nd edition

(revised) 1928.

Principles of Gestalt Psychology 740pp. 1 12 figures. 39 tables. 1935.
Malinowski Bronislaw, Crime and Custom in Savage Society

152pp. 6 plates. 1926.

Sex and Repression in Savage Society 250pp. 1927.
See also Ogden, C. K.
Murphy, Gardner, An Historical Introduction to Modern Psychology

488pp. 5th edition (revised) 1949.
Paget, R., Human Speech Some Observations, Experiments, and Conclusions

as to the Nature, Origin, Purpose and Possible Improvement of Human

Speech 374pp. 5 plates. 1930.
Petermann, Bruno, The Gestalt Theory and the Problem of

Configuration 364pp. 20 figures. 1932.
Piaget, Jean, The Language and Thought of the Child

220pp. 3rd edition (revised and enlarged) 1959.

Judgment and Reasoning in the Child 276 pp. 1928.

The Child's Conception of the World 408pp. 1929.

The Child's Conception of Physical Causality 37Spp. 1930.

The Moral Judgment of the Child 435pp. 1932.

The Psychology of Intelligence 198pp. 1950.

The Child's Conception of Number 266 pp. 1952.

The Origin of Intelligence in the Child 448pp. 1953.

The Child's Conception of Geometry 428pp. 1960.
Piaget, Jean and Inhelder, Barbel, The Child's Conception of Space

51 2 pp. 29 figures. 1 956.
van der Hoop, J. H., Character and the Unconscious 2'</0 pp. 7525.
Woodger, J. H., Biological Principles 505pp. 7525.

(Reissued with a npw introduction 1 966. )
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P5x Piaget, Jean, 1896-

The child's conception of the world,
London* Routledge Q £• Paul [1929]

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